and with the latter improved taste in architecture and decoration; and so
it has been with this colony.  A musical society has for some years
flourished here, and a few months back in society for the encouragement of
painting was started — yclept [sic] the Wilgie Club.  This Club, although
in its infancy, determined to hold an annual exhibition of paintings in
oil and water colors [sic], and has met with much encouragement, for the
collection which Lady Fraser has graciously consented to open on the 4th
June next will comprise a large number of paintings by modern English
painters who exhibit regularly at the Academy and other London Galleries,
as well at the Salon in Paris, and also many pictures from the collections
of residents in Perth and the neighbourhood, in addition to the
contributions of members of the Wilgie Club.  The exhibition will, we are
confident, be highly appreciated, and we trust that it will meet with such
success as to ensure its annual repetition and the founding of a West
Australian School of Arts, and so prove that we are not behind the Eastern
Colonies in our love of the beautiful and true.  We understand that the
Hon Secretary, Mr Bernard H. Woodward, will be glad to receive intimation
from any gentlemen, who are willing to lend any pictures in their
collections for this exhibition....

inauguration was chronicled some few months ago.  The collection of
pictures, which will be opened by Lady Fraser for the inspection, and we
may say, to many of our readers, the instruction of the West Australian
public, will be in three divisions.  

(1) The sketches and drawings by
members of the Wilgie Club, most of which have local interest, both in the
artist and the locality, and show the budding native talent until now
almost dormant.  

(2.) A large collection of masterly and finished sketches
and finished pictures including some by rising artists of the modern
English school — as well as some by English artists who have already made
their mark on the walls of the Royal Academy and other London exhibitions.
 
(3.) A collection of pictures lent for exhibition by gentlemen resident
in the colony, most of which are known to us all either in our social
associations or by repute.  As regards the last, it will no doubt astonish
many persons to find how good, and one may say how representative a group
of pictures of merit can be brought together from local collections.  It
is intended that this first exhibition shall be the forerunner of an
annual display, and that, if possible, a nucleus of a society shall be
formed which shall encourage the study of art and the raising of a school
of painters, sculptors, and architects on the broad foundation of the
Royal Academy and schools of London.  An object which in its attempt as
well as in its success, is so eminently calculated to educate and advance
us in the world of higher aspirations of better appreciation of the
beauties of nature and life may well be hailed with satisfaction, and
command hearty wishes for its success.  We understand that the Hon
secretary, Mr Bernard Woodward, will be pleased to receive information of
pictures in collections of owners willing to have them exhibited in the
Loan Division....