Art and Handcraft in the Woman's Building
of the World's Columbian Exposition

54 ART AND HANDICRAFT Women painters have always excelled in portraiture, certainly the most difficult, if not the highest, branch of art. It is an odd thing too that art finds its best expression now in the north, among the women as among the men. To go as far north as possible, the number of Swedish and Norwegian women who liave won honors in France far outranks that of any other nation. No matter how much one claims for the women who have lived, for the women who now live one can claim more. Rosa Bonheur PORTRAIT SKETCH. Allegra Egglestone, United States. has painted pictures which entitle her to the high position which, she occu- pies. Marie Cazin, in both sculpture and painting, has achieved high distinc- tion. Virginie Demont- Breton is hardly less dis- tinguished in art than her illustrious father. A Ger- man, Dora Hitz, is found worthy to be a member of the fastidious “ Champ-de- Mars,” while Alix d’Anét- lian, a Belgian, is also a member of this exacting society. Some of the best work in the last exhibition of this same Societé Nation- ale was contributed by Marie Breslau, a Swiss, a member of the society from the time of its or- ganization in 1890. A famous Danish woman is Anna Archer. Emma Lowstadt Chadwick is a Swede whom we wish we might claim, since she is the wife of an American. Anna Bilinska is a Pole.* In England there are many women painters who rank quite above the average Englishman. Mrs. Stanhope Forbes, whom we would also like to claim, since she began her art career in the schools of the New York Art League, paints more beautiful pict- * An interesting picture by that remarkable young Russian, Marie Bashkirtseff, may be seen among the French pictures in the Woman’s Building.—[Ed.]