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JOURNAL: NEEDLEWORK IN NEWCOMB ART SCHOOL
Another interesting consideration of the time, is the changed role
which women are assuming in the world’s work. The practice of the
arts seems to attract thein, not to speak of other professions aside
from the intention of this article. Art schools are filled with girl
students and every walk of artistic life has its ambitious, successful
women practitioners. It is noteworthy, however, that the craft of
the needle, the traditional resource of women confronted with the
problem of a livelihood, has not suggested itself more naturally as a
field of limitless artistic as well as practical possibility.
We all know how splendid has been the success of individuals in
this field of art, of a few guilds, and schools; but, in view of its
possibilities, one may say that only trails have been blazed, if the
phrase mnay pass, in an otherwise .unpeopled country; but what a
country! how beautiful and how accessible to skill and inmagination!
This field, moreover, is especially accessible to women, and indeed,
in this country at least, it is theirs exclusively; but it is especially
accessible to them by reason of a technique practiced fromn childhood
and needing only the culture of artistic training to flower at once into
an art-craft of puissant beauty. Again, it is accessible through its
simplicity of means, which it shares with painting, in that its materials
are few and not necessarily costly. It is even less exacting than
painting as to place and light. It may be pursued almost anywhere;
its material may.be secured through the mail and its products find a
market, even throuigh the same inexpensive carrier

Unfortunately, the charm of color is lost in reproduction, and
this is much; for in the subtle contrast of color, the deft choice of
hues in infinite variety, lies half the power of the designer, and con
stitutes a resource for the needlewoman, which cannot be overesti
mated. This is, however, a matter of course and fully understood
by all. The point most worthy of emphasis, and not so commonly
known. is the boundless possibility inherent in needlecraft1for the
young woman of
talent and ambi
tion, who chooses
to make herself
mistress of the art.
But in this mastery
of the subject lies
the difficulty, for
the average young
person confidently
expects to get
something f o r
nothing. She has
not yet learned
that professional
skill may not be
secured in a “vaca
tion course” of
three weeks, and
that the applause
of friends is not
always the verdict
of the world of
strangers