Integrity, Artistic Endeavor and Constantin Brancusi

The Bishop of Nice carefully observedaffection, a craving for security, or the pleasures
Michelangelo's painting of the murals in the Matisseof conformity, the creators hold fast. It follows;
Chapel in Venice. He concluded the artist was athey can call their sacred souls their own.
"...man of genius, who, all his life, worked,Constantin Brancusi was a model of artistic
searched, strained...in a long struggle...to draw nearintegrity. As a young Romanian Sculptor, he
the truth and the light."walked penniless to Paris to develop his craft. By
The world produces few geniuses. It producesthe time of his death in 1957 at age 81, he was
many artistic people - painters, sculptors, writers,widely acclaimed one of the finest sculptors of
photographers, for instance-who are willing tothe twentieth century. In responding to a critic of
forgo profits and material comforts in the strugglehis soaring forms and master reductions, he
to express their own vision of 'the truth and thedeclared, "The idea is the essence of things."
light.' Rather than give in to the market place ofBrancusi's life was as pure and untainted as his
commercial buyers, countless numbers labor on towork. He shunned publicity, even when his exhibits
make their own creative statement. Only a limiteddrew thousands. He lived quietly in Paris and
number will achieve a livelihood exclusively fromworked determinedly in a small studio tucked
these creations.away in a blind alley, while making no effort to
Uncompromising artists exemplify the first greatmarket his works. Some he refused to sell and
virtue-individual integrity. They have the capacitybequeathed to the People of France.
to hold to a standard of upright conduct when it isHis death was as discreet as his life. The body
inconvenient or unprofitable to do so. For in itswas placed on a makeshift bier, and only the
bedrock essence, integrity is the ability to formclosest friends knew of his passing.
and stand by an idea. Unintimidated by a need for