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gesso, gilding, and lacquer, and although it forms a part of the School of Design, is used for research purposes by students of other Schools. It offers opportunities for large mural painting, and its students sometimes get experience on the decoration of actual buildings.

166. In the School of Drawing and Painting the training aims at the development of a sense of form and design through the study of the human figure. All students of the College are expected to devote a considerable part of their time to Drawing from the Life, and those attached to this School are required to reach a reasonable standard of intelligent, constructive draughtsmanship before advancing to the study of painting. Painting from Still Life is practised in order to establish a sound method of painting, and is followed by painting from the Life. Students are encouraged to make genuine studies which can be used in carrying out designs, rather than merely skilful drawings to be regarded as ends in themselves. Subjects are set each month for composition, and the most promising sketches are carried out on a larger scale, so that the various stages in the building up of a picture may be followed out and given a real relationship to one another. Projects for mural decoration are considered in relation to an architectural scheme, and wall-spaces in the College are used for occasional experiment. Advanced students also have the opportunity of helping those members of the staff who are carrying out public decorations.

167. The School of Engraving deals with the practice of all forms of Engraving, Etching and Printing, such as Aquatint, Mezzotint, and Wood Engraving, Line Engraving, Drypoint and Lithography. Separate classes in these subjects were built up, and first-rate equipment with presses formed, under Sir Frank Short, R.A., P.R.E., who, when recognition as a separate School was given in 1913, became its first Professor.

168. In the School of Sculpture the study of the figure is the main basis of training. In addition to modelling, the consideration of other materials, such as wood and stone, is regarded as essential. It is recognised that the execution of monumental groups will not afford occupation to all students, and architectural work, lettering, glazed-earthenware and small pottery figures may form part of the

course.

169. Although the training of teachers is no longer looked upon as the chief object of the College, as in the days of the National Art Training School, it remains an important function. A limited number of students who have obtained their Diplomas, on grounds of technical and creative experience, are admitted to the special Course for Art Teachers, which occupies the whole of a College session. This offers a closely organised course in the theory and practice of teaching, and the means by which art schools can be brought into touch with local and national life and their requirements. Special

attention in this course is given to the handicrafts, and a third of the students' time is reserved for continued study in the branch which they have made their chief interest. The demand for Collegetrained students as teachers in schools is still a strong tradition throughout the country, and arises in secondary schools as well as in art schools.

170. Students.-Students are drawn from all parts of the country, but predominantly from the large industrial centres. As an exception the Birmingham district may be mentioned, where the organisation of central and branch schools is unusually complete and self-sufficing. In recent years the number of full-time students from the London area has increased and at present forms about a third of the whole. The remainder live in hostels and lodgings, and for these in particular the Students' Common Room is of the greatest value in out-of-college hours. Here meals are provided at a very low cost, and opportunities for work, including the provision of an etching-press and printing apparatus, as well as for rest and recreation are afforded. The Common Room, which is organised and carried on by committees of students, also serves as a centre for the activities of the students' Library, Dramatic Society, Lectures, Dances, and Sports Clubs. It is thus a very important factor in the corporate life of the College, both in broadening the cultural outlook of individuals, and by bringing together students of unusual abilities, but of widely varying tastes, aims and experiences.

171. Before coming to the College a few students have already worked in some industry, but the majority have passed directly from school to a local art school and there undergone a course of two, three or more years. A good many have already done some parttime or full-time teaching in connection with art schools, and some have saved enough money by teaching or other work to take a College course, or to return to College for the special course for art teachers. One of the best of the Design School students in recent years had been a master in a secondary school. The average age at joining is at present just under 21 and, at leaving, about 24. As no student is allowed to spend more than five years in the College, except with the special permission of the Principal, and only students of exceptional merit, or those taking the Professional Course for Art School Teachers, may spend more than four years, the "professional art student" receives no encouragement.

172. It is difficult to get exact information as to the occupations ultimately followed by those who have studied at the College. In the fine arts some years must elapse as a rule before a reputation can be made as a means of livelihood such work is notoriously risky. The economic conditions in recent years have caused a diminution of well-paid designers, and checked experiments in using new designs. A small number of students take positions in industries

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as regular designers, but more dispose of work as "free-lances, often covering a varied field. There have been occasional cases of employment by large firms as advisers on purchase and matters of policy in design. The demand for posters and the many other applications of illustration to the purposes of advertisement and propaganda probably attracts the greatest number, and stage and exhibition production is gaining keen students. A number of the well-known posters in the streets and underground railways are by old students of the College, and at least two who left in 1925 have been engaged in designing and executing scenery and costumes in London. Under present conditions the teaching profession occupies the largest number, but it should be borne in mind that such posts are the easiest to verify, and that a number are held for part-time while artistic production is carried on as well. The increase in the number of secondary schools, and the growing recognition of the important part that art education may hold in the life of such schools have brought an additional demand for alert and really well qualified teachers. Of 73 students who left the College in 1926, six are working as painters of pictures or decorations, eight as illustrators and commercial or industrial designers, two at architectural drawing, one at scientific drawing, two at stage production, ten are teaching at art schools, full-time, eight part-time, and nine in secondary and public schools: five have returned to homes in America, South Africa and India, three are studying abroad, and two married. The remaining nineteen report no definite occupation, or ill-health, or have given no information, though some are doubtless carrying on handicrafts and other activities.

173. The College in 1925-26.-Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, R.A., and Mr. Alfred Drury, R.A., took the places of Sir John Burnett, A.R.A., and Mr. Reid Dick, R.A., as Visitors for Architecture and Sculpture respectively. Mr. E. W. Tristram, A.R.C.A. was promoted to the Professorship of Design and the vacancies in the School of Sculpture were filled by the appointment of Mr. Ernest Cole as Professor and Mr. H. S. Moore, A.R.C.A. as Assistant. Other new members of the staff were Mr. R. Capey, A.R.C.A. (Assistant in Design), Mr. B. E. Allen, A.R.C.A. (Metal-work and Enamelling), Mr. Alan Durst (Woodcarving), Mr. W. Staite Murray (Pottery), and Mr. R. W. Stewart, A.R.C.A. (Lithography).

174. At the beginning of the year 112 new full-time students joined the College. Other full-time students below the Diploma stage were 93 in the second year, 40 in the third year and 8 in the fourth year. The distribution of these students by Schools was Design 117, Painting 99, Sculpture 21, Architecture 9 and Engraving 7. Students in other schools attend for instruction in Architecture, especially in their first year of study, and individual students from other schools study in the Engraving School.

The College was attended also by 34 full-time students who had obtained the Diploma. Of these 10 specialised in Painting, 9 in Design and 15, of whom 8 had the Diploma in Design and 7 in Painting, took the post-diploma course for intending teachers.

175. During the year the number of students instructed in the Craft Classes were :

College Students.

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176. On the results of tests at the end of the year Diplomas were awarded to 23 students in Design, 24 in Painting, 4 in Sculpture, 2 in Architecture and one in Engraving. For particular crafts taught in the Engraving School 27 Certificates were awarded. The 15 students who took the post-diploma course for intending teachers were adjudged, after a written test, to have completed the course satisfactorily and became entitled to the endorsement, upon their Diplomas of Associateship of the College, of the Teaching Certificate.

177. At the International Exhibition of Modern Decorative and Industrial Art held in Paris from May to October, 1925, the College received the award of two Grands Prix and one Diplôme d'Honneur. Four students of the College were awarded silver medals on the same occasion.

2. Art Schools (England).

178. Art Schools will in future be regulated as a particular branch of the provision for Further Education, and, as will be seen on referring to page 56, the new Regulations are of a simple and general character. It is believed that under them each art school can develop without hindrance those activities which are reasonably justified by the needs and aspirations of the population which the school is meant to serve. Some of the more important schools may have wider functions than are customary. Thus a few are able to train specialist teachers of art. In the general interest it is necessary that the Board should control the recognition of schools for this particular purpose. Some large schools, again, may serve as places of advanced study for students who have attended other art schools. The relations between art schools in this matter can best be settled directly by their authorities. It is the individual authorities also which must in the first place settle such matters as co-operation between art schools and technical schools so far as this may be advisable for the instruction of particular groups of students. Questions of this kind would not in any case lend themselves to

specific regulation, and the Board's attitude must be that of criticism or advice or encouragement as may be suggested by the observation of Your Majesty's Inspectors. The new regulations entail in this respect no material departure in policy, the most important specific change being the discontinuance of the former rule which restricted the freedom of school authorities in the appointment of principal teachers. Such appointments may now be made without reference to specific qualifications, subject only to the general requirement that teaching staffs are suitable and sufficient in number and qualifications for providing adequate instruction in each subject in which instruction is given. The encouragement of sound training for the work of art teaching as a permanent and whole-time occupation will in future depend upon the recognition by the Burnham Committee of certain qualifications as equivalent to degrees for the purpose of teaching in grant-aided schools. Apart from this, school authorities may still give a preference, so far as full-time teaching is concerned, to those who have recognised qualifications which attest both technical competence in a branch of artistic work and a suitable pedagogic preparation based on a sufficient standard of general education.

179. Art schools form one class in so far as their primary purpose is to teach one or more of the artistic subjects, which include painting, modelling, illustration, design and handicraft. They can hardly be described in any more specific terms. Some of them are self-contained institutions, others are departments of larger institutions. Most of the greater schools are in the first class, but there are some very important schools in the second class, and, in general, it may be said that when an art school is part of a larger institution the head of that institution exercises an administrative rather than an educational control in the art school. Some art schools in both classes are little more than evening classes with opportunities for, rather than a development of, day study, and joint appointments to teach in such schools and in ordinary day-schools for general education are not unknown. Others have an extensive development of day instruction and can fully occupy the time of a staff of full-time teachers, and in most of these schools visiting and specialist teachers are also employed. A few schools have only a small attendance of evening students, but the majority, not excluding schools in which day instruction is well developed, have many more evening than day students. In respect of the types and aims of students there are also great differences between schools, though few are attended exclusively by students of any one type. Young people who are studying drawing and painting, or modelling, in the hope of ultimately succeeding as painters or sculptors are not found in substantial numbers in any provincial school, and it is only in a few of the London schools that such students are common. The less speculative paths of artistic work in which some measure of individual

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