gravely misunderstood, by both young painters and sculptors, especially
by the latter. Because I am always urging them to imitate organic forms,
they think if they carve quantities of flowers and leaves, and copy them
from the life, they have done all that is needed. But the difficulty is
not to carve quantities of leaves. Anybody can do that. The difficulty
is, never anywhere to have an _unnecessary_ leaf. Over the arch on the
right, you see there is a cluster of seven, with their short stalks
springing from a thick stem. Now, you could not turn one of those leaves
a hair's-breadth out of its place, nor thicken one of their stems, nor
alter the angle at which each slips over the next one, without spoiling
the whole as much as you would a piece of melody by missing a note. That
is disposition of masses. Again, in the group on the left, while the
placing of every leaf is just as skilful, they are made more interesting
yet by the lovely undulation of their surfaces, so that not one of them
is in equal light with another. And that is so in all good sculpture,
without exception. From the Elgin marbles down to the lightest tendril
that curls round a capital in the thirteenth century, every piece of
stone that has been touched by the hand of a master, becomes soft with
under-life, not resembling nature merely in skin-texture, nor in fibres
of leaf, or veins of flesh; but in the broad, tender, unspeakably subtle
undulation of its organic form.
167. Returning then to the question of our own practice, I believe that
all difficulties in method will vanish, if only you cultivate with care
enough the habit of accurate observation, and if you think only of
making your light and shade true, whether it be delicate or not. But
there are three divisions or degrees of truth to be sought for, in light
and shade, by three several modes of study, which I must ask you to
distinguish carefully.
I. When objects are lighted by the direct rays of the sun, or by direct
light entering from a window, one side of them is of course in light,
the other in shade, and the forms in the mass are exhibited
systematically by the force of the rays falling on it; (those having
most power of illumination which strike most vertically;) and note that
there is, therefore, to every solid curvature of surface, a necessarily
proportioned gradation of light, the gradation on a parabolic solid
being different from the gradation on an elliptical or spherical one.
Now, when your purpose is to represent and learn the anatomy, or
otherwise characteristic forms, of any object, it is best to place it in
this kind of direct light, and to draw it as it is seen when we look at
it in a direction at right angles to that of the ray. This is the
ordinary academical way of studying form. Lionardo seldom practises any
other in his real work, though he directs many others in his treatise.
168. The great importance of anatomical knowledge to the painters of the
sixteenth century rendered this method of study very frequent with them;
it almost wholly regulated their schools of engraving, and has been the
most frequent system of drawing in art-schools since (to the very
inexpedient exclusion of others). When you study objects in this
way,--and it will indeed be well to do so often, though not
exclusively,--observe always one main principle. Divide the light from
the darkness frankly at first: all over the subject let there be no
doubt which is which. Separate them one from the other as they are
separated in the moon, or on the world itself, in day and night. Then
gradate your lights with the utmost subtilty possible to you; but let
your shadows alone, until near the termination of the drawing: then put
quickly into them what farther energy they need, thus gaining the
reflected lights out of their original flat gloom; but generally not
looking much for reflected lights. Nearly all young students (and too
many advanced masters) exaggerate them. It is good to see a drawing come
out of its ground like a vision of light only; the shadows lost, or
disregarded in the vague of space. In vulgar chiaroscuro the shades are
so full of reflection that they look as if some one had been walking
round the object with a candle, and the student, by that help, peering
into its crannies.
169. II. But, in the reality of nature, very few objects are seen in
this accurately lateral manner, or lighted by unconfused direct rays.
Some are all in shadow, some all in light, some near, and vigorously
defined; others dim and faint in aerial distance. The study of these
various effects and forces of light, which we may call aerial
chiaroscuro, is a far more subtle one than that of the rays exhibiting
organic form (which for distinction's sake we may call "formal"
chiaroscuro), since the degrees of light from the sun itself to the
blackness of night, are far beyond any literal imitation. In order to
produce a mental impression of the facts, two distinct methods may be
followed:--the first, to shade downwards from the lights, making
everything darker in due proportion, until the scale of our power being
ended, the mass of the picture is lost in shade. The second, to assume
the points of extreme darkness for a basis, and to light everything
above these in due proportion, till the mass of the picture is lost in
light.
170. Thus, in Turner's sepia drawing "Isis" (Edu. 31), he begins with
the extreme light in the sky, and shades down from that till he is
forced to represent the near trees and pool as one mass of blackness. In
his drawing of the Greta (S. 2), he begins with the dark brown shadow of
the bank on the left, and illuminates up from that, till, in his
distance, trees, hills, sky, and clouds, are all lost in broad light, so
that you can hardly see the distinction between hills and sky. The
second of these methods is in general the best for colour, though great
painters unite both in their practice, according to the character of
their subject. The first method is never pursued in colour but by
inferior painters. It is, nevertheless, of great importance to make
studies of chiaroscuro in this first manner for some time, as a
preparation for colouring; and this for many reasons, which it would
take too long to state now. I shall expect you to have confidence in me
when I assure you of the necessity of this study, and ask you to make
good use of the examples from the Liber Studiorum which I have placed in
your Educational series.
171. III. Whether in formal or aerial chiaroscuro, it is optional with
the student to make the local colour of objects a part of his shadow, or
to consider the high lights of every colour as white. For instance, a
chiaroscurist of Lionardo's school, drawing a leopard, would take no
notice whatever of the spots, but only give the shadows which expressed
the anatomy. And it is indeed necessary to be able to do this, and to
make drawings of the forms of things as if they were sculptured, and had
no colour. But in general, and more especially in the practice which is
to guide you to colour, it is better to regard the local colour as part
of the general dark and light to be imitated; and, as I told you at
first, to consider all nature merely as a mosaic of different colours,
to be imitated one by one in simplicity. But good artists vary their
methods according to their subject and material. In general, Dürer takes
little account of local colour; but in woodcuts of armorial bearings
(one with peacock's feathers I shall get for you some day) takes great
delight in it; while one of the chief merits of Bewick is the ease and
vigour with which he uses his black and white for the colours of plumes.
Also, every great artist looks for, and expresses, that character of his
subject which is best to be rendered by the instrument in his hand, and
the material he works on. Give Velasquez or Veronese a leopard to paint,
the first thing they think of will be its spots; give it to Dürer to
engrave, and he will set himself at the fur and whiskers; give it a
Greek to carve, and he will only think of its jaws and limbs; each doing
what is absolutely best with the means at his disposal.
172. The details of practice in these various methods I will endeavour
to explain to you by distinct examples in your Educational series, as we
proceed in our work; for the present, let me, in closing, recommend to
you once more with great earnestness the patient endeavour to render the
chiaroscuro of landscape in the manner of the Liber Studiorum; and this
the rather, because you might easily suppose that the facility of
obtaining photographs which render such effects, as it seems, with
absolute truth and with unapproachable subtilty, superseded the
necessity of study, and the use of sketching. Let me assure you, once
for all, that photographs supersede no single quality nor use of fine
art, and have so much in common with Nature, that they even share her
temper of parsimony, and will themselves give you nothing valuable that
you do not work for. They supersede no good art, for the definition of
art is "human labour regulated by human design," and this design, or
evidence of active intellect in choice and arrangement, is the
essential part of the work; which so long as you cannot perceive, you
perceive no art whatsoever; which when once you do perceive, you will
perceive also to be replaceable by no mechanism. But, farther,
photographs will give you nothing you do not work for. They are
invaluable for record of some kinds of facts, and for giving transcripts
of drawings by great masters; but neither in the photographed scene, nor
photographed drawing, will you see any true good, more than in the
things themselves, until you have given the appointed price in your own
attention and toil. And when once you have paid this price, you will not
care for photographs of landscape. They are not true, though they seem
so. They are merely spoiled nature. If it is not human design you are
looking for, there is more beauty in the next wayside bank than in all
the sun-blackened paper you could collect in a lifetime. Go and look at
the real landscape, and take care of it; do not think you can get the
good of it in a black stain portable in a folio. But if you care for
human thought and passion, then learn yourselves to watch the course and
fall of the light by whose influence you live, and to share in the joy
of human spirits in the heavenly gifts of sunbeam and shade. For I tell
you truly, that to a quiet heart, and healthy brain, and industrious
hand, there is more delight, and use, in the dappling of one wood-glade
with flowers and sunshine, than to the restless, heartless, and idle
could be brought by a panorama of a belt of the world, photographed
round the equator.
LECTURE VII
COLOUR
173. To-day I must try to complete our elementary sketch of schools of
art, by tracing the course of those which were distinguished by faculty
of colour, and afterwards to deduce from the entire scheme advisable
methods of immediate practice.
You remember that, for the type of the early schools of colour, I chose
their work in glass; as for that of the early schools of chiaroscuro, I
chose their work in clay.
I had two reasons for this. First, that the peculiar skill of colourists
is seen most intelligibly in their work in glass or in enamel; secondly,
that Nature herself produces all her loveliest colours in some kind of
solid or liquid glass or crystal. The rainbow is painted on a shower of
melted glass, and the colours of the opal are produced in vitreous flint
mixed with water; the green and blue, and golden or amber brown of
flowing water is in surface glassy, and in motion "splendidior vitro."
And the loveliest colours ever granted to human sight--those of morning
and evening clouds before or after rain--are produced on minute
particles of finely-divided water, or perhaps sometimes ice. But more
than this. If you examine with a lens some of the richest colours of
flowers, as, for instance, those of the gentian and dianthus, you will
find their texture is produced by a crystalline or sugary frost-work
upon them. In the lychnis of the high Alps, the red and white have a
kind of sugary bloom, as rich as it is delicate. It is indescribable;
but if you can fancy very powdery and crystalline snow mixed with the
softest cream, and then dashed with carmine, it may give you some idea
of the look of it. There are no colours, either in the nacre of shells,
or the plumes of birds and insects, which are so pure as those of
clouds, opal, or flowers; but the _force_ of purple and blue in some
butterflies, and the methods of clouding, and strength of burnished
lustre, in plumage like the peacock's, give them more universal
interest; in some birds, also, as in our own kingfisher, the colour
nearly reaches a floral preciousness. The lustre in most, however, is
metallic rather than vitreous; and the vitreous always gives the purest
hue. Entirely common and vulgar compared with these, yet to be noticed
as completing the crystalline or vitreous system, we have the colours of
gems. The green of the emerald is the best of these; but at its best is
as vulgar as house-painting beside the green of bird's plumage or of
clear water. No diamond shows colour so pure as a dewdrop; the ruby is
like the pink of an ill-dyed and half-washed-out print, compared to the
dianthus; and the carbuncle is usually quite dead unless set with a
foil, and even then is not prettier than the seed of a pomegranate. The
opal is, however, an exception. When pure and uncut in its native rock,
it presents the most lovely colours that can be seen in the world,
except those of clouds.
We have thus in nature, chiefly obtained by crystalline conditions, a
series of groups of entirely delicious hues; and it is one of the best
signs that the bodily system is in a healthy state when we can see these
clearly in their most delicate tints, and enjoy them fully and simply,
with the kind of enjoyment that children have in eating sweet things.
174. Now, the course of our main colour schools is briefly this:--First
we have, returning to our hexagonal scheme, line; then _spaces_ filled
with pure colour; and then _masses_ expressed or rounded with pure
colour. And during these two stages the masters of colour delight in the
purest tints, and endeavour as far as possible to rival those of opals
and flowers. In saying "the purest tints," I do not mean the simplest
types of red, blue, and yellow, but the most pure tints obtainable by
their combinations.
175. You remember I told you, when the colourists painted masses or
projecting spaces, they, aiming always at colour, perceived from the
first and held to the last the fact that shadows, though of course
darker than the lights with reference to which they _are_ shadows, are
not therefore necessarily less vigorous colours, but perhaps more
vigorous. Some of the most beautiful blues and purples in nature, for
instance, are those of mountains in shadow against amber sky; and the
darkness of the hollow in the centre of a wild rose is one glow of
orange fire, owing to the quantity of its yellow stamens. Well, the
Venetians always saw this, and all great colourists see it, and are thus
separated from the non-colourists or schools of mere chiaroscuro, not by
difference in style merely, but by being right while the others are
wrong. It is an absolute fact that shadows are as much colours as lights
are; and whoever represents them by merely the subdued or darkened tint
of the light, represents them falsely. I particularly want you to
observe that this is no matter of taste, but fact. If you are especially
sober-minded, you may indeed choose sober colours where Venetians would
have chosen gay ones; that is a matter of taste; you may think it proper
for a hero to wear a dress without patterns on it, rather than an
embroidered one; that is similarly a matter of taste: but, though you
may also think it would be dignified for a hero's limbs to be all black,
or brown, on the shaded side of them, yet, if you are using colour at
all, you cannot so have him to your mind, except by falsehood; he never,
under any circumstances, could be entirely black or brown on one side of
him.
176. In this, then, the Venetians are separate from other schools by
rightness, and they are so to their last days. Venetian painting is in
this matter always right. But also, in their early days, the colourists
are separated from other schools by their contentment with tranquil
cheerfulness of light: by their never wanting to be dazzled. None of
their lights are flashing or blinding; they are soft, winning, precious;
lights of pearl, not of lime: only, you know, on this condition they
cannot have sunshine: their day is the day of Paradise; they need no
candle, neither light of the sun, in their cities; and everything is
seen clear, as through crystal, far or near.
This holds to the end of the fifteenth century. Then they begin to see
that this, beautiful as it may be, is still a make-believe light; that
we do not live in the inside of a pearl; but in an atmosphere through
which a burning sun shines thwartedly, and over which a sorrowful night
must far prevail. And then the chiaroscurists succeed in persuading them
of the fact that there is a mystery in the day as in the night, and show
them how constantly to see truly, is to see dimly. And also they teach
them the brilliancy of light, and the degree in which it is raised from
the darkness; and instead of their sweet and pearly peace, tempt them to
look for the strength of flame and coruscation of lightning, and flash
of sunshine on armour and on points of spears.
177. The noble painters take the lesson nobly, alike for gloom or flame.
Titian with deliberate strength, Tintoret with stormy passion, read it,
side by side. Titian deepens the hues of his Assumption, as of his
Entombment, into a solemn twilight; Tintoret involves his earth in coils
of volcanic cloud, and withdraws, through circle flaming above circle,
the distant light of Paradise. Both of them, becoming naturalist and
human, add the veracity of Holbein's intense portraiture to the glow and
dignity they had themselves inherited from the Masters of Peace: at the
same moment another, as strong as they, and in pure felicity of
art-faculty, even greater than they, but trained in a lower
school,--Velasquez,--produced the miracles of colour and
shadow-painting, which made Reynolds say of him, "What we all do with
labour, he does with ease;" and one more, Correggio, uniting the sensual
element of the Greek schools with their gloom, and their light with
their beauty, and all these with the Lombardic colour, became, as since
I think it has been admitted without question, the captain of the
painter's art as such. Other men have nobler or more numerous gifts, but
as a painter, master of the art of laying colour so as to be lovely,
Correggio is alone.
178. I said the noble men learned their lesson nobly. The base men also,
and necessarily, learn it basely. The great men rise from colour to
sunlight. The base ones fall from colour to candlelight. To-day, "non
ragioniam di lor," but let us see what this great change which perfects
the art of painting mainly consists in, and means. For though we are
only at present speaking of technical matters, every one of them, I can
scarcely too often repeat, is the outcome and sign of a mental
character, and you can only understand the folds of the veil, by those
of the form it veils.
179. The complete painters, we find, have brought dimness and mystery
into their method of colouring. That means that the world all round them
has resolved to dream, or to believe, no more; but to know, and to see.
And instantly all knowledge and sight are given, no more as in the
Gothic times, through a window of glass, brightly, but as through a
telescope-glass, darkly. Your cathedral window shut you from the true
sky, and illumined you with a vision; your telescope leads you to the
sky, but darkens its light, and reveals nebula beyond nebula, far and
farther, and to no conceivable farthest--unresolvable. That is what the
mystery means.
180. Next, what does that Greek opposition of black and white mean?
In the sweet crystalline time of colour, the painters, whether on glass
or canvas, employed intricate patterns, in order to mingle hues
beautifully with each other, and make one perfect melody of them all.
But in the great naturalist school, they like their patterns to come in
the Greek way, dashed dark on light,--gleaming light out of dark. That
means also that the world round them has again returned to the Greek
conviction, that all nature, especially human nature, is not entirely
melodious nor luminous; but a barred and broken thing: that saints have
their foibles, sinners their forces; that the most luminous virtue is
often only a flash, and the blackest-looking fault is sometimes only a
stain: and, without confusing in the least black with white, they can
forgive, or even take delight in things that are like the [Greek:
nebris], dappled.
181. You have then--first, mystery. Secondly, opposition of dark and
light. Then, lastly, whatever truth of form the dark and light can show.
That is to say, truth altogether, and resignation to it, and quiet
resolve to make the best of it. And therefore portraiture of living men,
women, and children,--no more of saints, cherubs, or demons. So here I
have brought for your standards of perfect art, a little maiden of the
Strozzi family, with her dog, by Titian; and a little princess of the
house of Savoy, by Vandyke; and Charles the Fifth, by Titian; and a
queen, by Velasquez; and an English girl in a brocaded gown, by
Reynolds; and an English physician in his plain coat, and wig, by
Reynolds: and if you do not like them, I cannot help myself, for I can
find nothing better for you.
182. Better?--I must pause at the word. Nothing stronger, certainly, nor
so strong. Nothing so wonderful, so inimitable, so keen in unprejudiced
and unbiassed sight.
Yet better, perhaps, the sight that was guided by a sacred will; the
power that could be taught to weaker hands; the work that was faultless,
though not inimitable, bright with felicity of heart, and consummate in
a disciplined and companionable skill. You will find, when I can place
in your hands the notes on Verona, which I read at the Royal
Institution, that I have ventured to call the æra of painting
represented by John Bellini, the time "of the Masters." Truly they
deserved the name, who did nothing but what was lovely, and taught only
what was right. These mightier, who succeeded them, crowned, but closed,
the dynasties of art, and since their day, painting has never flourished
more.
183. There were many reasons for this, without fault of theirs. They
were exponents, in the first place, of the change in all men's minds
from civil and religious to merely domestic passion; the love of their
gods and their country had contracted itself now into that of their
domestic circle, which was little more than the halo of themselves. You
will see the reflection of this change in painting at once by comparing
the two Madonnas (S. 37, John Bellini's, and Raphael's, called "della
Seggiola"). Bellini's Madonna cares for all creatures through her child;
Raphael's, for her child only.
Again, the world round these painters had become sad and proud, instead
of happy and humble;--its domestic peace was darkened by irreligion, its
national action fevered by pride. And for sign of its Love, the Hymen,
whose statue this fair English girl, according to Reynolds' thought, has
to decorate (S. 43), is blind, and holds a coronet.
Again, in the splendid power of realisation, which these greatest of
artists had reached, there was the latent possibility of amusement by
deception, and of excitement by sensualism. And Dutch trickeries of base
resemblance, and French fancies of insidious beauty, soon occupied the
eyes of the populace of Europe, too restless and wretched now to care
for the sweet earth-berries and Madonna's ivy of Cima, and too ignoble
to perceive Titian's colour, or Correggio's shade.