House Art Exhibits

There ought to be a law. Something--anything--to keep House art committees from exhibiting everybody who likes to doodle nudes as he talks to his girl on the telephone.

Fortunately, however, hard searching does reveal some goodies here and there in little nooks and crannies of the Eliot and Leverett House art shows. But first you have to fight your way through the trash. And, believe me, it isn't easy. Especially when a good part of the trash (in the case of Leverett House) is gigantic geodesic pyramids ingeniously designed and arranged to impede viewers in the most efficient manner possible.

The most interesting exhibitor of this, our Washington Square, I found to be Dan Dennett '63 (Eliot), a sculptor. Though Mr. Dennett has by no means perfected his technical skill, his originality, depth of perception, and understanding for his materials go pretty much unrivalled by the other participants. His stone sculpture of a "Crusader" is particularly effective in its bulky angularity and sense of determination.

Maarten Henkes' (Leverett) loose and spontaneous pastel sketches of various city-and land-scapes are also quite refreshing. True, one has the feeling that one has seen very similar things before in travel books--but only in the very best travel books.

In the painting field, there is nothing truly outstanding although Philip Kerr's (Leverett) "Sky"--a thickly painted canvas showing bent refraction rings in bright red hues around a light source--is most pleasant indeed.

And, finally, we come to the perhaps hundreds of photographs, most of which are appallingly poorly conceived, composed, and printed. Surprisingly enough, the bright spot comes among the color photos where, owing to the extreme complexity of good color photography, one also finds the worst exemplars. Mark E. Talisman '63 (Leverett) is the only photographer whose work I have seen so far at Harvard who uses color because color adds to the meaning of his picture; most use it because of all those pretty blues and reds which bear no relation whatever to what the photographer wants to say. Especially good is Talisman's pale and subtle Rouen street view, shot from a low angle to emphasize the cobblestones.

The best thing about these exhibits is the optimism they suggest. Perhaps next fall, when the Visual Arts Center is finished, we can hope to see a greater number of artists matching the most talented now showing.