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on their heads the epithets of "Ashcan Gang," "Black Gang," "Revolutionary School" and the like.
One might ask why the present reputed desert of criticism followed on a century of good production. This  subject is not, however, the one [[strikethrough]]chosen[[/strikethrough]] for discussion. What we plan to show is that criticism is not as bad as it is painted, in fact, not much worse than or about as good as art itself, and that for a century there has been a more than [[strikethrough]]quite[[/strikethrough]] respectable tradition of sound evaluation of American art. To simplify proceedings, I [[strikethrough]]have chosen to [[/strikethrough]] shall discuss only painting, as the field of sculpture has been less thoroughly rediscovered than the field of painting and there are few present-day studies by which we may measure the contemporary[[crossed-out]]ies[[/crossed-out]] opinions expressed about Powers, Rogers, Greenough, Rush and the like. 
Perhaps our first critic was our first CITIZEN, George Washington, who (according to legend) is said to have bowed to the figures in Charles Willson Peale's Staircase Group. Earlier, Franklin, friend of science and knowledge ingeneral, had confidently prophesied (in a letter to Peale, written in 1771) that American art would flourish, saying
The Arts have always travelled westward, and there is no doubt of their flourishing hereafter on our side of the Atlantic, as the number of wealthy