Art: Bird

Two years ago, at the exhibition of the John Quinn Collection in Manhattan, old ladies and dilettantes gathered round an object, gaping, making a murmur of “Is it a bird? If it isn’t, what is it? Whatever it is, is it art?” It was tall, shiny, spindling, like a magnification of an exclamation point, like a Freudian symbol. Manufactured by famed Sculptor Constantin Brancusi of Rumania, it was titled, with a supreme disregard of appearance, with an arrogant, baffling simplicity, “The Bird.”

Last week this scene was replayed in the Customs Court of Appeals in Manhattan. Another one of Brancusi’s birds, a bright, sinuous piece of brass pipe, tapering at the ends in a not perfectly symmetrical curve, has been shipped from Paris to Edward Steichen, Manhattan photographer and artist. Denied duty-free admission as a work of art, it had been subjected to a tax of $229.35, more than a third of what Purchaser Steichen had paid for it. Appealing the decision, Purchaser Steichen appeared in court accompanied by experts who would support his claim that the bright enigma was a work of art.

Frank Crowninshield, famed editor of Vanity Fair, Forbes Watson, editor of The Arts, William Henry McBride, Jacob Epstein,† lyn Museum of Art, Art Critic Henry McBride, Jacob Epstein,* famed sculptor, agreed that “The Bird” was a worthy example of fine art. Most emphatic was Sculptor Epstein, who brought with him to court a 5,000 year old piece of stone, reputed to be an Egyptian representation of a hawk. “It is a matter of indifference what it represents,” said Sculptor Epstein, “but if the artist calls it a bird, so do I. In this there are certain elements of a bird. The profile suggests perhaps the breast of a bird.” “It might also suggest the keel of a boat or the crescent of a new moon,” said Presiding Justice Waite. Assistant Attorney General Marcus Higgenbotham said: “A mechanic could have done this thing.” Countered Sculptor Epstein: “No … he could have polished this but he could not have conceived it.” Finally, sick of a nagging, abstruse controversy, Justice Waite intelligently decided to delay a decision until testimony from Birdmaker Brancusi, now in Paris, could be secured.

Birdmaker Brancusi’s U. S. attorney said: “Brancusi takes this action against “The Bird” as a challenge to all his art and to his reputation.” Director William Henry Fox offered to buy “The Bird” for the Brooklyn Museum, “if the funds and the sculpture were available.”

Newsreaders who saw pictures of the elongated, tilted, curved brass bar, wondered whether it had a comparatively hidden meaning, not completely explained by its title or its admirers.

Constantin Brancusi is a man who leaves his critics shuddering, growling, bearing eyeteeth at each other, mumbling through cold masks of horror. His defenders on the other hand shout their quick praises in a complicated language. Famed Poet Carl Sandburg has written this poem:

“Brancusi is a galoot; he saves tickets to take him nowhere; a galoot with his baggage ready and no time table; ah yes, Brancusi is a galoot; he understands birds and skulls so well, he knows the hang of the hair of the coils and plaits on a woman’s head, he knows them so far back he knows where they came from and where they are going; he is fathoming down for the secrets of the first and the oldest makers of shapes.

“. . . O Brancusi, keeping hardwood planks around your doorsteps in the sun waiting for the hardwood to be harder for your hard hands to handle, you, Brancusi, .with your chisels and hammers, birds going to cones, skulls going to eggs. . . .

“Brancusi, you will not put a want ad in the papers telling God it will be to His advantage to come around to see you; … if God is saving a corner for any battling bag of bones, there will be one for you, Brancusi.”

*Not to be confused with famed Sculptor Jacob Epstein (see below). †Not to be confused with noted art patron and collector, Jacob Epstein of Baltimore (see above).