Heroic Turks in Stone

Mustapha Kemal announced that hereafter statues of national heroes may be erected in Turkish cities. Immediate interest is aroused because this decision is in direct contravention of the teachings of the Koran, as interpreted in Turkey for the last 1,200 years. During that time sculpture which represented men or animals has been forbidden in all Mohammedan countries. In Turkey not even paintings or photographs have been permitted. Kemal's decision breaks with religion and ends a tradition.

" Intoxicants, games of chance and stones set up are the devil's work," says the Koran. But Kemal Pasha declares, "No nation can progress without art." And since the Koran was revealed to Mahomet, as Kemal explained in his announcement last week, at a time when the chief works of sculpture were idols, its prohibition of images need no longer apply.

Many tons of antiques, from the Hittite to the Byzantine period, unearthed at Sardis, ancient capital of King Croesus, in Asia Minor, were received by the Metropolitan Museum. The site of Sardis is called by Sir William Ramsay "the most promising ground for archaeological work in the world." The city has been buried and preserved by an earthquake--as Pompeii by a volcano. The material received is described by Thomas Hastings, New York architect, as " the most magnificent material which has come to the United States out of Asia Minor."

The Prince of Wales purchased (for $10,000) a realistic painting of Western Life by the Montana cowboy artist, Charles M. Russell. The price was far in advance of any previously received by Russell, and much more than is usually paid for the work of living artists.

Swords and daggers from Spain and Italy, Indian and Indo-Persian weapons and armor; primitive arms from Africa, Borneo and the Malay Peninsula; powder horns, helmets and halberds; wheelock guns and Near Eastern swords; daggers and sabers; Venetian rapiers, make up a collection of arms and armor formed in Austria and now in the Anderson galleries. Some of it belonged to the Archduke Charles.

A painting by a Chinese girl, Rose Yawyow, was given the first award at a recent exhibition of 200 oil paintings at the Seattle Fine "Arts Society.