"U.S. ART SHOCK"

"U. S. Art Shock"

"Hell's ringing bells!" shouted a large, exasperated Detroiter last week into his telephone. "I wish the Sun had never heard of Romney or of me either!"

The gentleman referred to the New York Sun, which was obtaining a telephonic interview, and to George Romney, the 18th Century English cabinet-maker's son who achieved the niceties of Cavendish Square and rivaled Sir Joshua Reynolds as London's favorite painter. Naturally, the Sun had heard of Artist Romney, and quite as naturally of hell's-bellsing Lawrence P. Fisher. The latter is president of Cadillac Motor Co. and next-to-youngest of the six Fisher Brothers who rose from their father's Ohio blacksmithy to dominance in General Motors Corp.

To Brother Lawrence, as to the other Fishers, the world of mechanics is understandable, governed by ineluctable laws of physics. The Fishers have learned these laws well and by their aid gained gold. But it was quite another world which Brother Lawrence faced last week, a world strange and unaccountably called Art. Upon its vague terrain, he was nonplussed, vexed. That is why he cried, "Hell's ringing bells!"

Mr. Fisher had bought a painting, with extraordinary results. It was a portrait of the Duchess-Countess of Sutherland, supposedly executed by George Romney in 1782 when the chaste, ringleted subject was only 17. Brother Lawrence paid the Howard Young Galleries of Manhattan about $200,000 for the canvas.

The present Duke of Sutherland, lazying at Lausanne, saw a photograph of the portrait in the Sun, with a report of its presence in the U. S. For a moment the Duke wondered if he was bemused. But there could be no doubt that his pictured ancestress remained as she had for years, at his country home in Guildford, England. He so informed the Sun.

Galleryman Young quickly concluded that he, and through him Mr. Fisher, had been duped. Galleryman Young went to Detroit and gave Mr. Fisher back his money. But despite this material satisfaction, the world of Art remained troublous for Mr. Fisher. What about the rest of the score of paintings which he had employed Galleryman Young to buy for him? How could one ever be sure of the genuine? Even expert Sir Joseph Duveen, in a similar case, had proved nothing (TIME, Feb. 18, et seq.). Row upon row of glistening Cadillacs, or Mr. Fisher's new and magnificent Fokker (see p.14), are logical, congenial objects of thought. But two paintings, placed side by side for comparison, may jeopardize the reason.

Over the telephone, Mr. Fisher related his tribulations: "I am [collecting] and I'm blamed if I know why people should get so excited about it. . . . Ever since . . . that story about the phoney Romney -- if it is phoney -- I have had to have 15 or 20 guards around my house. When people hear about you paying a lot of money for a picture they get the idea that your house is lined with gold and they do everything but climb into your bedroom windows. Honest, I wish this thing would die down. I'm sick of hearing about it."

In England the affair was described as "The United States Art Shock." The following history of the portrait was disclosed: Galleryman Young had purchased it from A. L. Nicholson, London dealer. Dealer Nicholson had purchased it for about $1,650 at a London auction in March, 1928. At that time it was catalogued as a copy. Three copies of the original are known to exist.

Regardless of the listing of the portrait, Dealer Nicholson continued last week to insist that it is a genuine Romney. He challenged the Duke of Sutherland to permit a public comparison of the two.