ABSTRACT
The public persona of a scold that Albert Barnes had crafted for himself, whether deliberately or not, largely freed him from the civic demands that might otherwise have been made of a rich and prominent collector. Barnes attempted to demonstrate his point by describing the reactions of a painter and a fire marshal to the clangor of fire engines. Turning to a description of his first camp meeting, Barnes told his white listeners about witnessing “the vivid, colorful drama performed in a quite individual manner.” Barnes’s speech was a formidable challenge in the best tradition of civil rights advocacy. Barnes talked about the application of scientific method to aesthetics, and in lauding John Dewey’s theory of art as experience; he provided a capsule restatement of his own core belief in the possibility of “verifiable objectivity” in judging pictures. Barnes, de Mazia, the Mullen sisters, and assorted secretaries had offices on the second floor.
