Special Training
It is a very superficial conception of workmanship which sets it in
conflict with originality. There is often an inherent antagonism between
the impulse for freedom and spontaneity which is characteristic of genius,
and a conventional, hard-and-fast rule or method of securing certain
technical results; but there is no antagonism between the boldest
originality and the most complete mastery of craftsmanship. There is,
rather, a deep and vital relationship between the two. For every art is a
language, and to secure power and beauty and adequacy of expression a man
must command all the secrets and resources of the form of speech which he
has chosen. The power of the great artist rests, in the last analysis,
upon the freedom with which he uses his material; and this freedom does
not come by nature; it comes by training. It is fatal to the highest
success to have the command of a noble language and to have nothing to say
in it; it is equally fatal to have noble thoughts and to lack the power of
giving them expression. Technical skill is not, therefore, an exterior,
mechanical possession; it is the fitting of tools and material to heart
and mind; it is the fruit of character; it is the evidence of sincerity,
thoroughness, truthfulness. In his characteristically suggestive comment
upon the Japanese artist Hokusai, Mr. John La Farge gives an interesting
account of the training established and enforced in the school of the
Kanos, a family of painters which survived the vicissitudes of more than
four centuries. The course of study in a Kano school covered at least ten
years, and the average age of graduation was thirty. The rules of conduct
were rigid; the manner of life simple to the point of bareness; the
discipline of work severe and unbroken. During the first year and a half
of study the pupil devoted his entire time to copying certain famous works
in the possession of the school; making, in the first instance, a copy
from the picture set before him, and then reproducing his own copy again
and again until every stroke and detail was thoroughly comprehended and
mastered. In the course of eighteen months sixty pictures were studied
with this searching thoroughness; the secrets of skill in each were
uncovered, the sources of beauty or power discerned; and the eye and hand
of the pupil gained intelligence, quickness, penetration. Month after
month passed in what seemed to be a monotony of mechanical imitation; but
in this arduous and literal reproduction of the skill of others was laid
the sure foundations of individual skill. This devout attention to methods
secured for a considerable number of men a technical expertness for which
we look, as a rule, only in the work of the greatest artists. The result
of this training was not mechanical skill, but truth and freshness of
observation. The signature of the artist in question reveals not an
imitative but an original nature, not a faculty absorbed in accuracy but
in passion for expression: "Hokusai, the Old Man Crazy about Painting."
The arduous patience of these Oriental students of painting bore its fruit
in a tradition of skill which was in itself an immense stimulus to the
aspiring and ambitious; it established standards of craftsmanship which
made the possession of expert knowledge a necessity on the part of every
one who seriously attempted to practice the art. Mr. La Farge comments
upon the level of superior artistic culture which these Japanese artists
had attained. They had advanced their common skill so far that a superior
man began at a great height of attainment, and was compelled to exhibit
power of a very rare order before he could claim any kind of prominence
among his fellows.
The establishment of such a standard in any art, profession, or occupation
has the immense educational value of making clear to the student, at the
very beginning of his career, the prime importance of mastering in detail
every part of the work which he has undertaken to do. There is no place in
the modern working world for the sloven, the indifferent, or the
unskilled; no one can hope for any genuine success who fails to give
himself the most thorough technical preparation, the most complete special
education. Good intentions go for nothing, and industry is thrown away, if
one cannot infuse a high degree of skill into his work. The man of medium
skill depends upon fortunate conditions for success; he cannot command it,
nor can he keep it. In the fierce competition of the day the trained man
has all the advantages on his side; the untrained man invites all the
tragic possibilities of industrial and economic failure. He is always at
the mercy of conditions. To know every detail, to gain an insight into
every secret, to learn every method, to secure every kind of skill, are
the prime necessities of success in any art, craft, or trade. No time is
too long, no study too hard, no discipline too severe for the attainment
of complete familiarity with one's work and complete ease and skill in the
doing of it. As a man values his working life, he must be willing to pay
the highest price of success in it,--the price which severe training
exacts.
The external prosperity which is called success is of value because it
evidences, as a rule, thoroughness and ability in the man who secures it,
and because it supplies the ease of body and of mind which is essential to
the fullest and most effective putting forth of one's power; and the sane
man, even while he subordinates it to higher things, never entirely
ignores or neglects success. The possession of skill is to-day the
inexorable condition of securing this outward prosperity; and, as a rule,
the greater a man's skill the more enduring his success. But skill has
other and deeper uses and ends. Thoroughness and adequacy in the doing of
one's work are the evidences of the presence of a moral conception in the
worker's mind; they are the witnesses to the pressure of his conscience on
his work. Slovenly, careless, and indifferent work is dishonest and
untruthful; the man who is content to do less than the best he is capable
of doing for any kind of compensation--money, reputation, influence--is an
immoral man. He violates a fundamental law of life by accepting that which
he has not earned.
Skill in one's art, profession, or trade is conscience applied; it is
honesty, veracity, and fidelity using the eye, the voice, and the hand to
reveal what lies in the worker's purpose and spirit. To become an artist
in dealing with tools and materials is not a matter of choice or
privilege; it is a moral necessity; for a man's heart must be in his
skill, and a man's soul in his craftsmanship.