I have ... gone for great masses of light and shade, relieved against
one another, the only bright local colour being the blue of the
workmens' coats and trousers. I have intentionally avoided the whole
business of "flat decoration" by "making the things part of the walls,"
as one is told is so important. On the contrary, I have treated them as
pictures and have tried to make holes in the wall--that is, as far as
relief of strong light and shade goes; in the figures I have struggled
to keep a certain quality of bas-relief--that is, I have avoided distant
groups--and have woven my compositions as tightly as I can in the very
foreground of the pictures, as without this I felt they would lose their
weight and dignity, which does seem to me the essential business in a
mural decoration, and which makes Puvis de Chavannes a great decorator
far more than his flat mimicry of fresco does.... Tintoretto, in S.
Rocco, is my idea of the big way to decorate a building; great clustered
groups sculptured in light and shade filling with amazing ingenuity of
design the architectural spaces at his disposal: a far richer and more
satisfying result to me than the flat and unprofitable stuff which of
late years has been called "decoration."...
Above all, I thoroughly disbelieve in the cant of mural decorations
preserving the flatness of a wall. I see no merit in it whatever. Let
them be massive as sculpture, but let every quality of value and colour
lend them depth and vitality, and I am sure the hall or room will be
richer and nobler as a result.
_C. W. Furse._