Evening Republican, Volume 17, Number 185, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 August 1913 — At what AGE is WOMAN MOST BEAUTIFUL? [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

At what AGE is WOMAN MOST BEAUTIFUL?

jva&js&vsjrM c&mvir 4 OE to beauteous ideals, long nurtured ■■TT and jealously guarded! An old worn■m/ an is hand Some, wrinkles are beWv coming, and a dash of rouge no more Tv is a crime against the symphony of f feminine loveliness. Evil days have befallen the traditional “bloom of youth,” “chestnut tresses” and the soulful “brown orbs” of Which poets have sung Immemorial. Grandmother at last is -coming lntp her own. She is ensconced upon an artistic pedestal for the edification of those “snips of girlhood” who have the temerity to hint “she was handsome in her day.”' She’s a beauty right now, thank you! Mother and grandmother owe their idealistic rejuvenation to the New York men whose stock in trade Is feminine loveliness—rthe artists who paint and etch and model. They’ve taken us do wn a bit, those of us who rafye of fair ( hair, bewitching eyes, peach-bloom tints and aquiline features. For on this single point they are unison: , A woman can be beautiful at fifty. , Harken to what Harrison Fisher, Irvin Wiles, Edwin Blashfleld and Victor D. Brenner say. This galaxy of illustrator, painter, mural decorator and sculptor baß come to the defense of physical beauty in a woman past the middle span of life. They’ve all seen matrons and spinsters who were handsome when the half-century post had faded on the ten-year distant horizon. Cheer up, mothers, grandmothers, aunts and cousins—you whose sllver-Bprinkled tresses droop over sylvan folds 6f face and brow! What matters it if nature rebels at the strain of busy life and sears your velvet cheeks with the inevitable wrinkles of motherly devotion? You’re handßome still! The fair debutante may appeal to the eye for beauty no more than her mother from whom the color of buoyant youth has flown; whose flesh has lost the satin gloss of girlhood days; whose tender lips have compressed In the firmness that comes of mental strength and mature character None the less Is the artistic eye today appro dative of vivacious girlhood with its luminous flesh and radiant nature. But It has turned to another - quarter for a type of beauty that has survived from the birth of man, bat never shone resplendent In the light of public approval. The mature woman—she who has the fullness of life, the mental development and the strong force of character written in every age line of her countenance—has been called beautiful. She has been striving for this verdict for centuries and centuries, but only now has her day of reckoning with youth come. She can matoh her charms with her sex in its teens and stand before the modern day court of art without fear or flavor. The middle and the past middle-aged women of New York have heard the verdict. You are beautiful! ’ r Victor D. Brenner, sculptor, who knows the soft and pleasing lines of figure as well as he knows the face, is to the fore as the most outspoken And uncompromising Indorser of this new viewpoint In art "All women are to bq admired,” he put it generally, and declares that femininity in every condition of servitude and age has points for artistic admiration. The poetic has its place in Sculptor Brenner’s reasoning as much as the hard and fast rules for physical perfection. He personifies the timeworn adage: “Beauty is ./Only skin deep.” Beneath the flesh, beneath the walls of muscle and the frame of bone goes Sculptor Brenner for his Ideals. Mentality, morality and warmth of heart are all his prescribed lngrefiiences for the most beautiful woman. "Beauty all depends upon the viewpoint of the Individual sculptor,” declares Mr. Brenner. "He Is Influenced by the nature of his subject, by the task he has before him. If beauty of childhood is his theme, then his and soul are wrapped In the Infinite lines of tendernsss and delight to be found In early youth. “If the sculptor .seeks the poetry of springs time, he perchance requisitions beauty of an age from eighteen to twenty. He none the less appreciates this bloom of early life and it can’t help but draw forth his admiration. “From twenty-fire to thirty I might classify as another type of beauty; a beauty that is beginning to bloom In all lta radiance, fully developed

and taking bn the richness of a valley flower before the touch of withering heat. “From thirty-five to forty takes us to a period where the average, human unschooled in more than a superficial appreciation of beauty might remark that voluptuousness was giving way to the ravages of age. I have found many, many beautiful between the ages of thirty-five and forty —positively handsome. “Thiß beings us to the half-century mark, where woman has all the strength of character Imparted by a lifetime of observation. Here enters personal magnetism, a factor which figures largely in the determination of beauty. If face, form and temperament harmonize, she 16 placed in tlid category of the lovely. “I have seen women fifty years old who I considered exceedingly handsome.” Edwin Blashfleld, mural decorator, says: “There are four types or ages of beauty—children, Who are most handsome; youth, between the ages of sixteen and nineteen; middle age, ranging from twenty-five to thirty, and women who arh mounting the ladder of time .toward the half-century mark. “I have seen many handsome women at fortyfive and fifty. Sometimes wrinkles are exceedingly beautiful in women of that age. Persons who use their brains a great deal in after life generally are exceedingly Attractive. Wrinkles enhance this type. “I have no particular choice of beauty as regards age. I use models from nineteen to thirty, but by no means do I consider they are the embodiment of all that Is beautiful.” Harrison Fisher, Illustrator, haa his personal tastes as regards the age of charming women. "I prefer the beauty of a woman from sixteen to twenty-eight,” he says. “Between those periods of life I consider her the most charming because she embodies'all the spirit of youth, the innocence of girlhood and lacks the veneer of worldliness that comes to a woman later in life. But I am not decrying the attractions of older women. I have seen them at thirty and thirty-five and even forty whom I consider more handsome than girls. I know women of fifty who 1 consider embody all the elements of general beauty. They may have lost some of the fairness of their girlhood days, but they have made up for it In physical development, in mental sharpness and in the strong characteristics of the face. "There are so many good-looking women in New York It’s hard to pick out any particular beauty of any type or of any age. Women all are to be admired.” Irvin Wiles, eminent portrait painter, who baa daily opportunities to observe types of beauty, is more lenient as to advanced age than either Mr. Fisher, Mr. Brenner or Mr. Blashfleld. "I have seen women who were handsome at seventy,’*'he declared. A woman at thirty may be far more handsome than one at fifteen or eighteen. They say age Is no respecter of beauty, but you may reverse it and remark that beauty la no respecter of age. Much of the secret of beauty depends upon, the physical and mental care a woman takes of herself. The portrait painter does not look so much for beauty In his subject as he does for the medium that permits

him to emphasize beauty. Of course the major ity of our sitters want us to paint them as beautiful as is consistent with the laws of art A woman of thirty has developed. She haa learned the Value of dress, how to attire herself in a manner that enhances any physical charms she may possess. Girlhood lacks the development of more mature age. Therefore, a woman of thirty may present a far more attractive appearance than the girl in her ’teens or Just past the twenty mark. “The womaq, beauty at fifty is less In evidence than the handsome feminine In her 'teens or below the age of thirty. But I have seen handsome women at fifty; women whose features, whose personalities and whose physical development struck me as being amazingly handsome. “From my view I don’t think dress has much to do with good looks. The true lover of beauty gazes and can enthuse over cut of features and tint of complexion without dwelling on clothes. I consider’ a woman between the age of eighteen and twenty to be in the bloom of youth. Naturally, youth is attractive; It la like a rose in Its brilliancy beneath a light morning dew."