ON THE SECONDARY, PURPLE.
Purple, the third and last of the secondary colours, is composed of
_red_ and _blue_, in the proportions of five of the former to eight of
the latter; proportions which constitute a perfect purple, or one of
such a hue as will neutralize and best contrast a perfect yellow, in the
ratio of thirteen to three, either of surface or intensity. When mixed
with its co-secondary colour, green, purple forms the tertiary _olive_;
and, when compounded with the remaining secondary, orange, it
constitutes in like manner the tertiary _russet_. Of the three secondary
colours it is the coolest, as well as the nearest in relation to _black_
or shade; in which respect, and in never being a warm colour, it
resembles blue. In other respects also, purple partakes of the
properties of blue, which is its archeus, or ruling colour; hence it is
to the eye a retiring colour, that reflects light little, and loses
rapidly in power in a declining light, and according to the distance at
which it is viewed. By reason of its being the mean between black and
blue it becomes the most retiring of all positive colours. Nature
employs this hue beautifully in landscape, as a sub-dominant, in
harmonizing the broad shadows of a bright sunshine ere the light sinks
into deep orange or red. Girtin, who saw Nature as she is, and painted
what he saw, delighted in this effect of sunlight and shadow. As a
ruling colour, whether in flesh or otherwise, purple is commonly too
cold, or verges on ghastliness, a fault which is to be as much avoided
as the opposite extreme of viciousness in colouring, stigmatized as
foxiness.
Yet, next to green, purple is the most generally pleasing of the
consonant colours; and has been celebrated as a regal or imperial
colour, as much perhaps from its rarity in a pure state, as from its
individual beauty. Romulus wore it in his trabea or royal mantle, and
Tullus Hostilius, after having subdued the Tuscans, assumed the pretexta
or long robe, broadly striped with purple. Under the Roman emperors, it
became the peculiar emblem or symbol of majesty, and the wearing of it
by any who were not of the Imperial family, was deemed a "treasonable
usurpation," punishable by death. At the decline of the empire, the
Tyrian purple was an important article of commerce, and got to be common
in the clothing of the people. Pliny says, "Nepos Cornelius, who died in
the reign of Augustus Cæsar, when I was a young man, assured me that
the light violet purple had been formerly in great request, and that a
pound of it usually fetched 100 denaria (about £4 sterling): that soon
after the tarentine or reddish purple came into fashion; and that this
was followed by the Tyrian dibapha, which could not be bought for less
than 1000 denaria (nearly £40 sterling) the pound; which was its price
when P. Lentulus Spinter was Ædile, Cicero being then Consul. But
afterwards, the double-dyed purple became less rare, &c." The Tyrian
purple alluded to was obtained from the purpuræ, a species of shell-fish
adhering to rocks and large stones in the sea adjoining Tyre. On
account, probably, of its extreme costliness, it was frequently the
custom to dye the cloth with a ground of kermes or alkanet, previous to
applying the Tyrian purple. This imparted to the latter a crimson hue,
and explains doubtless the term, double-dyed. The Greeks feigned the
ancient purple to be the discovery of Hercules Tyrius, whose dog, eating
by chance of the fish from which it was produced, returned to him with
his mouth tinged with the dye. Alexander the Great is said to have found
in the royal treasury, at the taking of Susa, purple to the enormous
value of 5000 talents,[A] which had lain there one hundred and
ninety-two years, and still preserved its freshness and beauty.
When inclining to red, purple takes the name of _crimson_, &c.; and when
leaning to blue, the names of _violet_, _lilac_, _mauve_, _&c._ Blue is
a colour which it serves to mellow, or follows well into shade. The
contrast or harmonizing colour of purple is yellow on the side of light
and the primaries; while purple itself is the harmonizing contrast of
the tertiary _citrine_ on the side of shade, and less perfectly so of
the semi-neutral _brown_. As the extreme primaries, blue and yellow,
when either compounded or opposed, afford, though not the most perfect
harmony, yet the most pleasing consonance of the primary colours; so the
extremes, purple and orange, yield the most pleasing of the secondary
consonances. This analogy extends likewise to the extreme tertiary and
semi-neutral colours, while the mean or middle colours furnish the most
agreeable contrasts or harmonies.
In nature pure purple is not a common colour, and on the palette purple
pigments are singularly few. They lie under a peculiar disadvantage as
to apparent durability and beauty of colour, owing to the neutralizing
power of yellowness in the grounds upon which they are laid; as well as
to the general warm colour of light, and the yellow tendency of almost
all vehicles and varnishes, by which the colour of purple is subdued.
208. BURNT CARMINE
is the carmine of cochineal partially charred till it resembles in
colour the purple of gold, for which, in miniature and water-painting,
it is substituted. It is a magnificent reddish purple of extreme
richness and depth, eligible in flower-painting and the shadow of
draperies. As it is generally impossible, however, to alter the nature
of a pigment by merely changing its colour, burnt carmine is scarcely
more permanent than the carmine from which it is produced. If used,
therefore, it should be in body, and not in thin washes or as a glaze.
Durable pigments are admissible in any form; but semi-stable pigments
(gamboge excepted) should only be employed in body.
209. BURNT LAKE
holds the same relation to crimson lake as burnt carmine to ordinary
carmine; and is hence a weaker variety of the preceding, with less
richness, and likewise less permanence.
210. INDIAN PURPLE
is prepared by precipitating an extract of cochineal with sulphate of
copper. It is a very deep-toned but rather cold and subdued purple,
neither so red nor so brilliant as burnt carmine; and is chiefly of
service in draperies. It is apt to lose its purple colour in a great
measure on exposure to light and air, and assume an inky blackness; a
defect which becomes less apparent when the pigment is used in bulk.
211. MARS VIOLET,
_Violet de Mars_, _Purple Ochre_, or _Mineral Purple_, is a dark ochre,
native of the Forest of Dean in Gloucestershire. It is of a murrey or
chocolate colour, and forms cool tints of a purple hue with white. It is
of a darker colour than Indian red, which has also been classed among
purples, but has a similar body and opacity, and generally resembles
that pigment. It may be prepared artificially, and some natural red
ochres burn to this colour. Being difficult and sometimes impossible to
procure, Mars violet is often compounded; in which case it is liable to
vary both in hue and stability. As, however, Indian red is always taken
for its basis, the mixture is never wholly fugitive, nor exhibits any
very glaring contrast on exposure.
212. MIXED PURPLE.
Purple being a secondary colour, composed of _blue_ and _red_, it
follows of course that any blue and red pigments, which are not
chemically at variance, may be employed in producing mixed purples of
any required hue, either by compounding or grinding them together ready
for use, or by combining them in the various modes of operation in
painting. In such compounding, the more perfect and permanent the
original colours are, the more perfect and permanent will be the purple
obtained. To produce a pure purple, neither the red nor the blue must
contain or incline to yellow; while to compound a durable purple, both
the red and the blue must be durable also. Ultramarine and the reds of
madder yield beautiful and excellent purples, equally stable in water or
oil, in glazing or tint, whether under the influence of light or impure
air. Cobalt blue and madder red likewise afford good purples; and some
of the finest and most delicate purples in ancient paintings appear to
have been composed of ultramarine and vermilion, which furnish tints
equally permanent, but less transparent than the above, and less easily
compounded. Facility of use, and other advantages, are obtained at too
great a sacrifice by the employment of perishable mixtures, such as the
lakes of cochineal with indigo.
PERMANENT REDS. | PERMANENT BLUES.
|
Cadmium Red. | Cerulian Blue.
Liquid Rubiate. | Cobalt Blue.
Madder Carmine. | Genuine Ultramarine.
Rose Madder. | Brilliant Ultramarine.
Mars Red. | French Ultramarine.
Ochres. | New Blue.
Vermilions. | Permanent Blue.
It should be noted that all the above reds do not afford pure purples
with blue; those which contain more or less yellow, as cadmium red and
orange vermilion, furnish purples partaking more or less of olive, which
is a compound of purple and green. To those reds may be added the russet
Rubens Madder and the marrone Madder Brown, two pigments which are alike
eligible for mixed purple and mixed orange. No purple, it will be
remarked, equal in gorgeous richness to that produced from crimson lake
and Prussian blue is obtainable from the colours given; just as no mixed
green is of such depth and power if that blue be wanting as a
constituent. But, as our compound tints are given rather as examples of
durability than beauty, all semi-stable or fugitive mixtures are of
necessity ignored.
213. PURPLE MADDER,
_Field's Purple_, or _Purple Rubiate_, is the only durable organic
purple the palette possesses. Marked by a soft subdued richness rather
than by brilliancy, it leans somewhat towards marrone, and affords the
greatest depth of shadow without coldness of tint. Unfortunately, in the
whole range of artistic pigments there is no colour obtainable in such
small quantity as madder purple; hence its scarcity and high price cause
it to be confined to water-colour painting, in which the clearness and
beauty of its delicate tones render it invaluable in every stage of a
drawing. With raw Sienna and indigo or Prussian blue, subdued by black,
it gives beautiful shadow tints, and will be found useful in sky and
other effects compounded with cobalt, rose madder, French blue and
sepia, yellow ochre and cobalt, lamp black and cobalt, light red,
Vandyke brown, burnt Sienna, or aureolin. With great transparency, body,
and depth, it is pure and permanent in its tints, neither gives nor
sustains injury on admixture, dries and glazes well in oil, works well,
and is altogether most perfect and eligible. For fresco it is admirably
adapted, being quite uninjured by lime.
There is a lighter and slightly brighter sort, containing less colouring
matter and more base, which has all the properties of the above with
less intensity of colour. For the sake of cheapness, the purple is
sometimes compounded in oil, generally of brown madder and a blue.
Provided the latter be stable, transparent, and mix kindly, no greater
objection can be taken to this than to the neutral orange of brown
madder and yellow ochre.
214. VIOLET CARMINE
is a brilliant bluish purple of much richness, employed in draperies and
the like. It is prepared by precipitating an alcoholic extract of the
root of the _Anchusa tinctoria_, commonly known as alkanet, a plant
growing in the Levant, and some other warm countries. It was used by the
ancients as a dye, or as a groundwork to those stuffs which were to be
dyed purplish-red: the ladies in ancient times also employed it as a
paint. Its colouring matter or _anchusin_ has the character of a resin,
and is dark-red, softened by heat, insoluble in water, soluble in
alcohol and alkalis, and freely so in ether, fats, and volatile oils, to
all of which it imparts a brilliant red hue. To obtain anchusin, all the
soluble matters are first abstracted from the bruised root by water: it
is then digested in a solution of carbonate of potash, from which it may
be readily precipitated by an acid. Its alcoholic solution yields with
different reagents crimson, flesh-coloured, blue, and violet
precipitates, none of which, however, can be classed as durable. The
variety under notice, violet carmine, resembles the other colours
afforded by alkanet in not being able to withstand the action of light.
On continued exposure, it loses its beauty and brightness, together with
much of its colour, and, like Indian purple, assumes an inky blackness.
Hence it is unsuited to permanently pure effects, and should only be
used in body.
* * * * *
215. _Archil Purple._
Archil may be regarded as the English, cudbear as the Scotch, and litmus
as the Dutch name for one and the same substance, extracted from
several species of lichens by various processes. These lichens, which
are principally collected on rocks adjacent to the sea, are cleaned and
ground into a pulp with water, treated from time to time with ammoniacal
liquor, and exposed with frequent agitation to the action of the
atmosphere. Peculiar principles existing in the lichens are, by the
joint instrumentality of the air, water, and ammonia, so changed as to
generate colouring matter, which, when perfect, is expressed. Soluble in
water and alcohol, this colouring principle yields by precipitation with
chloride of calcium a compound known as 'Solid French Purple', a pigment
more stable than the archil colours generally, but all too fugitive for
the palette.
216. _Bismuth Purple._
A purple powder is capable of being produced from bismuth by passing
chlorine gas through the hydrated oxide suspended in a saturated
solution of potash. As soon as the oxide becomes brown-red, the mixture
is boiled and the liquid decanted off at once, the residue being
immediately washed first with alcohol and then with water. On the whole,
the result is not, for an artistic pigment, worth the trouble involved
in the preparation.
217. _Burnt Madder_
is obtained by carefully charring madder carmine until it becomes of the
hue required. Bearing the same relation to madder carmine as burnt
carmine to the carmine of cochineal, burnt madder is a permanent and
perfectly unexceptionable pigment. By reason, probably, of its great
price, it is not mentioned in trade catalogues, and must be held as
commercially unknown.
218. _Cobalt Purples_
are obtainable ranging from the richest crimson purple to the most
delicate violet. We have produced them by wet and dry methods, varying
in brilliancy and beauty, but characterised generally by want of body,
and frequently by a smalt-like grittiness. Chemically, good and stable
colours, they are not received with favour on the palette, and certainly
may be very well replaced by mixtures of cobalt blue and madder red.
When a permanent compound is obtainable equal in colour to an original
pigment, and superior in its physical attributes, no objection can
fairly be taken to its artistic preference. There are other things to be
considered in a pigment besides permanence, or even permanence and
colour combined. The two together do not constitute a perfect pigment,
that is, a material of practical utility and value. In the last
chapter, allusion was made to a green which possesses both the one and
the other, and yet is--at present, at least--quite unfitted for artistic
use. Hence, with a strong partiality for simple original pigments, we
are bound to confess there are cases where mixtures are justifiably
preferred. All we contend for is, that each constituent of such mixtures
should be stable, and neither give nor receive injury by being
compounded.
219. _Gold Purple_,
Purple of Cassius, or Cassius's Purple Precipitate, was discovered in
1683 by Cassius of Leyden. It is a compound of tin and gold, best formed
by mixing aqueous perchloride of iron with aqueous protochloride of tin,
till the colour of the liquid has a shade of green, and then adding this
liquid, drop by drop, to a solution of perchloride of gold, which is
free from nitric acid and very dilute: after twenty-four hours the
purple is deposited. When recently prepared, the colour is brightened by
boiling nitric acid. Not brilliant, but rich and powerful, this purple
varies in hue according to the mode of manufacture from deep crimson to
murrey or dark purple: it also differs in degrees of transparency.
Working well in water, it is an excellent though costly pigment, once
popular in miniatures, but at present rarely, if ever used, as purple
madder is cheaper, and perfectly well supplies its place. Retaining its
colour at a high red heat, it is now confined to enamel and porcelain
painting, and to tinging glass of a fine red. If, whilst in its hydrated
state, it be washed with ammonia, a bright purple liquid results, from
which a violet colour, somewhat less expensive, can be produced, by
combining the gold purple with alumina, and calcining the product in the
same way that is practised with cobalt. This compound may be exposed to
the action of the sun's rays for a year without being sensibly affected.
220. _Prussian Purple._
A prussiate of iron is obtainable of a violet hue, affording good shadow
tints and clear pale washes. It has not, however, been introduced as a
pigment, as ordinary Prussian blue tinged with red furnishes a similar
colour.
221. _Sandal Wood Purple._
Sandal wood contains about 16 per cent. of colouring matter, soluble
with difficultly in water, but readily dissolved by alcohol. From the
latter solution, chloride of tin throws down a purple, and sulphate of
iron a deep violet precipitate; neither of which is remarkable for
permanence.
222. _Tin Violet._
By heating chromate of stannic oxide to bright redness, a dark violet
mass is obtained, which is better adapted to enamel painting than to the
palette. It communicates in glazings a variety of tints, from rose-red
to violet.
* * * * *
So scant is the number of good purples in common use, that there are but
two which can be classed as durable, namely, purple madder and the true
Mars violet.
Foremost in the second group stands burnt carmine. As there are
different degrees both of permanence and fugacity, so are there
different degrees of semi-stability. Burnt carmine, burnt lake, Indian
purple, and violet carmine, all belong to this division; but the first
certainly is more permanent than the rest.
Rich and beautiful as it is, purple madder cannot be called brilliant;
while Mars violet is, of course, ochrous. Unlike green and orange,
therefore, purple can point to no original pigment at once vivid and
durable: as regards purple, brilliancy implies a semi-stability that
borders more or less closely on fugacity. Until the advent of a perfect
palette, however, brilliancy and semi-stability will doubtless hold
their own. Their present popularity may be seen by a glance at the lists
of artist-colours--lists compiled, be it remembered, in obedience to
the law of demand and supply. If art were really so much honoured as
some of its disciples pretend, none but durable colours would be
employed. In our opinion, if a picture be worth painting at all, it is
worth painting with permanent pigments; but many evidently think
otherwise. Deploring an error neither flattering to the craft they
practise nor to themselves, we would urge such to bear in mind this
axiom, semi-stable pigments become fugitive when used in thin washes.
Even in body they do not preserve their primitive hue, but in glazing
and the like, their colour altogether flies or is wholly destroyed.
It is this semi-stability, recommended to the thoughtless and
indifferent by the beauty which generally accompanies it, that is the
bane of modern art. Even our greatest painters have yielded to its
fascination. Who has not gazed upon one of Turner's fading pictures with
still more of sadness than enjoyment, that anything so grand, so
beautiful, so true, should slowly but surely be passing away? A feeling
akin to pity is conjured up at the sight of the helpless wreck,
abandoned amid the treacherous materials employed, and sinking deeper
and deeper. Mournful, indeed, is that mighty ruin of mind amid matter;
mournful the thought that in years to come, the monument sought for will
not be found.
FOOTNOTES:
[A] A talent of money, _i.e._, a talent's weight of silver, was equal to
nearly £244.