A Community Institution - Providing Opportunity for Civic and Provincial Service

     With slight changes, the following is quoted from Mr. Murrin's statement:
     "There is no city of importance in Canada where the public have poorer facilities for coming in contact with good pictures than Vancouver. The only facilities at present supplied are under the auspices of the B.C. Art League at its Gallery, 939 Granville Street, and these, through lack of funds, are by no means up to a standard reflecting credit on this City.
     Largely through the work of this League, an Art School was established some two years ago, and since then it has been making good progress, but inspiration to the students in the way of available exhibitions of painting is lacking. A large sum of money for the purchase of works of Art has been donated conditionally upon a suitable Gallery being built, and it is one of the main objects of the B.C. Art League to work for the erection of such a Gallery.
     "Funds at the disposal of the Art League are derived from two sources only: (1) Annual or Life subscriptions from members, and (2) a Grant from the City of Vancouver. The membership is of three classes - Active, Associate, and Life. At present the annual fee for each Active member is $3., for each Associate $5., and Life membership is $100.
     "Meantime, the funds available from these sources are quite insufficient to enable the Art League to carry out its work in a proper manner with credit to the City of Vancouver, and I am asking citizens of Vancouver and other residents of B.C. - not already members - to consider seriously becoming members under one or other of the classes named.
     "Never at any time was the work of the B.C. Art League more important than it is today, and the League, in addition to its other service, is doing its part throught public lectures to encourage artistic development in Vancouver."

     Art Lectures Well Attended

     The first lecture, by Mr. James Leyland, on "Prints and How to Know Them," was reported in Vancouver's three daily newspapers - the directing and editorial departments of which seem to vie with each other in being ready to give publicity to the work and aims of the League.
     Mr. Leyland certainly demonstrated to his audience that there was much to know about prints, and in a racily expressed lecture expounded not a little that even novices in art could carry away.

     Lettering and Illuminating

     Another evening (Wednesday, 7th December), not-withstanding a heavy snowfall in Vancouver, the lecture room at the Vanderpant Galleries was filled when Miss Grace W. Melvin, D.A. (Glas.), Instructress in Lettering and Illumination at the Glasgow School of Art, delivered an illustrated lecture on "Lettering and Illumination."
     Miss Melvin, who is a clear and effective speaker, first of all gave an informative and arresting synopsis of the history of the art of modern writing and printing, outlining the origin of the alphabet and its development from Egyptian, Phoenician, Greek and Roman sources. She followed that by a brief study of the sister art of Illumination. The lecturer mentioned numerous interesting details connected with the subject and held the attention of the audience throughout. Many fine examples of Lettering and Illumination were shown, and these were supplemented by the exhibition of a number of lantern slides, with the subjects of which Miss Melvin showed an intimate and well expressed knowledge.
     Members and executive of the B.C. Art League were well represented in the audience, including the President and Vice-President (Mr. T.W.B. London). In introducing the lecturer, Mr. London spoke with appreciation of the fact that Miss Melvin had been given a year's leave of absence from the Glasgow School of Art, so that she could teach during that period at Vancouver School of Applied Art - which was one of the practical products of the B.C. Art League.
     In expressing the thanks of the meeting to the lecturer for her very illuminating address, Mr. Fyfe-Smith also referred to the fact that Vancouver was indebted to the Glagow School of Art, not only for such an educative evening, but for their having given Miss Melvin's services to the local School of Art for twelve months without any exchange arrangement.
     The lecturer, in closing, said that though she had not been able to find any traditional work at present in Vancouver, she hoped that in the future, when Vancouver possessed an Art Gallery worthy of its position as an Empire City, there would be found a collection of good traditional work, calculated to inspire its students in the study of that art. She also expressed the hope that such students would then be housed in a School of their own, and that that would lead to the growth of a band of healthy Western Canadian illuminators, creating their own tradition.