National Art Week 1940
April 5, 2009
There is a unknown feeling in the air in the art world. Galleries are closing, art magazines are getting thinner and the future is a scary place for many in the arts. After a decade of abundance maybe todays feelings of uncertainty are more in line with how artists have always felt, outside the mainstream,foraging to make a claim in the world.
In 1940 under the newly re-elected Roosevelt Administration a National Art Week was decreed for November 25- December 1940. A year later the attack on Pearl Harbor would shift the American attention to war and begin the end of the WPA.
In1940 John Marin was asked to write an editorial for the New Jersey Palisadian. Marin’s words often are a jumble of thoughts with the emphasis on connotation but many of his words, written at a very uncertain time in history, apply 
today.
The the public:
It is Said- We are becoming- Art Conscious- therefore let there be an -Art Week- focused on the work done in – of and by America.
That out all of it will blossom forth – that- worth looking at-
This is the hope-
produce the artist and- presto- realization- not so fast- know you- that the artists is- not too Common- and that produced he must Encouragement- though courageous himself- he must have- like others about him- a good living- to do good work- this the art conscious public must help to bring about by purchasing that which they profess to love.
For the public to know- to discern the artist- the one who is- from the one who professes to be- isn’t too easy…..
The people must gradually learn to discern the fine things- those sensitive to beauty can- those not sensitive cannot.
Those sensitive will want- and if the want is great enough- the artist will appear to supply that want and- I repeat- he’s to be helped- to withhold that is to disobey the law of human relationships- and rest assured that he being an artist gives as much as he gets- he gives abundantly.
This work, etc.,- this artist is to be found in his-workshop-there seek him-expect him not to play the game social or self advertise-ment- it would appear in his work and the sensitive ones will have none of it. Beware of the ambitious one and the one who works all the time- he hasn’t time to think.
Go to him whose every effort is-the good job-
To him who delights in his living- to him who takes not himself to seriously and who can at times look and make faces at himself.
Don’t rave over bad paintings.
Don’t rave over good paintings.
Don’t everlastingly read messages into painting- there’s the Daisy- you don’t rave over or read messages into it- You just look at that bully flower- isn’t that enough!
