Massachusetts College of Art and Design - Palette and Pen Yearbook (Boston, MA)

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the new Life magazine every week, faithfully enlarging our horizon. Everything we did and saw in our four years, however removed, was an essential part of our school life; the forsythia and tulips, the rest periods, the dim white statues of our school are inseparably entangled in them all, — in the movies and the books and the museums as well as in the prescribed Don Quixotes and Munsell color charts. So in our usual fashion we have come to the end of the story with- out having nearly finished. We have made no mention of a hundred influences. We can only gratefully acknowledge that there was provided here in generous measure enough for all our eighty-two and more separate imaginations. There were perspective and por- traits, there were painters like Picasso and Da Vinci, there were stoicisms and idealisms, there were arts and crafts, there were ways of life and means of living; there was the whole world for us to choose from. — Susan T. Richert Harriet Rossy secretary Mary Kittredge, vice-president Payios Ghikas, treasurer Lor)ie Craigs president

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and thick-set Trinity, past bargain basements and ancient grave- yards. We stared into bookstore windows and beyond the har- bor, and we could never see far enough and wide enough. We stood in museum rooms where the years fell back to Spain of 1400 or Restoration England; we looked at blackened wood and gleaming silver, glass and stone and amber, rows of Greek vases, walls of French paintings; and we chose our favorites as care- fully as buyers. Then there were movies that afforded us, more than entertainment, the secret pleasures of disguise. Whenever we sat in a theatre we were no longer artists, no longer even of Boston, but dark and nameless symbols, part of an audience. We saw fewer plays, and they were sharp and bright to remember like a painting; but the movies were a long procession, gray and hazy, a continual superimposition of familiar faces and settings and gestures. We had each some purely private classics, like “Smilin’ Thru” or “The Unfinished Symphony,” that we loved so well and saw so often we could turn them on in our minds and see them over from beginning to end as often as we chose. And of course we read books all the time, passionately dis- covered the Russians and the Transcendentalists, Thomas Wolfe and G. K. Chesterton ; and it was often one of these instead of an assigned author that spoke to us most clearly. The Lippis and the Memmis and the Della Robbias, the Guelfs and the Ghibel- lines were a darkly beautiful undertone, while we could plainly hear the sighing in the shrub oaks and the glassy tinkling of the weeds where Thoreau was walking with the emerald fires of spring already burning in his head. No one could tell what might capture and lay hold of our imagination. We were easily moved by a figure of speech. We collected quotations and gloated in pri- vate over the shining words. And in time we used them all ; they found their way into English themes and history notebooks, into headlines and slogans; we used them over and over, so that any one watching might have traced our progress and accurately placed our literary periods. And while we made intellectual conquests the days were running on in the world outside. We noticed newspaper headlines like a dream within a dream. We saw I litler rise to power and heard Edward abdicate. We read

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The Cimabue Madonna A PAGEANT At the dawn of the Renaissance in the year one thousand two hundred and eighty, the people of Florence with rapture and acclaim carry the newly finished Madonna of Cimabue through the streets of their city to the Church of Santa Maria Novella. To the wondering eyes of the worshipping throng there appear visions of those sacred mysteries of the faith — The Annunciation and The Nativity. THE SPIRIT of the thirteenth century permeated our Christmas as- sembly when, as if in reincarnation, Cimabue’s “Madonna” was once again presented in glorious pageantry at the altar of the great cathedral in Florence. With the gathering of the monks, all sombre and reverent, the noise and bustle of our highly mechanized life lifted, and before us lay the Florentine beauty of ages past. In the opening procession, Florentine maidens scattered flowers on the path to be taken by the high priest, the royalty of Florence, with its large retinue, and the general populace. Dazzling robes of that era added special dignity to the procession, but the authenticity of the celebration was confirmed by a youth who carried at the end of the throng Cimabue’s painting of the “Madonna.” All in impressive pantomime the painting was presented at the altar and lifted high, accompanied by a solemn chant at the beginning and followed by choral music which gradually ascended to the exultant strains of “Salve Regina.” According to tradition, because of the breath-taking beauty and spiritual quality of the sacred painting, a miracle revealed the Holy Virgin as she appeared in the scene of the nativity. The mystical setting for this scene created a sheer artistic beauty as well as a spiritual inspiration; and commanded the silent admiration of the audience. — Constance Tocher It is equally worthy of mention to say that Mr. Porter, one of our greatly admired instructors, was the author of our Christmas pageant. Assisting him with the general settings and action was Dean Murray and Mr. Thompson, and the entire costuming was executed by Miss f lint. Our new (dee (ilub and Orchestra director, Mr. Theodore Marier, very successfully turned our musical group into an angel chorus.