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diff --git a/27194-8.txt b/27194-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7e84c57 --- /dev/null +++ b/27194-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2012 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Enjoyment of Art, by Carleton Noyes + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Enjoyment of Art + +Author: Carleton Noyes + +Release Date: November 7, 2008 [EBook #27194] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ENJOYMENT OF ART *** + + + + +Produced by Ruth Hart + + + + +[Note: for this online edition I have moved the Table of Contents to +the beginning of the text.] + + + +THE ENJOYMENT OF ART + +BY + +CARLETON NOYES + + +BOSTON AND NEW YORK +HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY +The Riverside Press, Cambridge +1903 + + +COPYRIGHT, 1903, BY CARLETON NOYES +ALL RIGHTS RESERVED +_Published, March, 1903_ + + +To +ROBERT HENRI +AND +VAN D. PERRINE + + +This day before dawn I ascended a hill and look'd at + the crowded heaven, +And I said to my spirit _When we become the enfolders of + those orbs, and the pleasure and knowledge of every + thing in them, shall we be fill'd and satisfied then?_ +And my spirit said _No, we but level that lift to pass and + continue beyond._ + +WALT WHITMAN + + +CONTENTS + +Preface +I. The Picture and the Man i +II. The Work of Art as Symbol 19 +III. The Work of Art as Beautiful 41 +IV. Art and Appreciation 67 +V. The Artist 86 + + + +PREFACE + +The following pages are the answer to questions which a young man +asked himself when, fresh from the university, he found himself +adrift in the great galleries of Europe. As he stood helpless and +confused in the presence of the visible expressions of the spirit of +man in so many ages and so many lands, one question recurred +insistently: _Why_ are these pictures? What is the meaning of all +this striving after expression? What was the aim of these men who +have left their record here? What was their moving impulse? Why, +why does the human spirit seek to manifest itself in forms which we +call beautiful? + +He turned to histories of art and to biographies of artists, but he +found no answer! to the "Why?" The philosophers with their +theories of aesthetics helped him little to understand the dignity and +force of this portrait or the beauty of that landscape. In the +conversation of his artist friends there was no enlightenment, for +they talked about "values" and "planes of modeling" and the +mysteries of "tone." At last he turned in upon himself: What does +this canvas mean to me? And here he found his answer. This work +of art is the revelation to me of a fuller beauty, a deeper harmony, +than I have ever seen or felt. The artist is he who has experienced +this new wonder in nature and who wants to communicate his joy, in +concrete forms, to his fellow men. + +The purpose of this book is to set forth in simple, untechnical +fashion the nature and the meaning of a work of art. Although the +illustrations of the underlying principles are drawn mainly from +pictures, yet the conclusions apply equally to books and to music. It +is true that the manifestations of the art-impulse are innumerable, +embracing not only painting, sculpture, literature, music, and +architecture, but also the handiwork of the craftsman in the +designing of a rug or in the fashioning of a cup or a candlestick; it is +true that each art has its special province and function, and that each +is peculiarly adapted to the expression of a certain order of emotion +or idea, and that the distinctions between one art and another are not +to be inconsiderately swept aside or obscured. Yet art is one. It is +possible, without confusing the individual characteristics essential to +each, to discuss these principles under the comprehensive rubric of +Art. + +The attempt is made here to reduce the supposed mysteries of art +discussion to the basis of practical, every-day intelligence and +common sense. What the ordinary man who feels himself in any +way attracted; towards art needs is not more and constantly more +pictures to look at, not added lore about them, not further knowledge +of the men and the times that have produced them; but rather what +he needs is some understanding of what the artist has aimed to +express, and, as reinforcing that understanding, the capacity rightly +to appreciate and enjoy. + +It is hoped that in this book the artist may find expressed with +simplicity and justice his own highest aims; and that the appreciator +and the layman may gain some insight into the meaning of art +expression, and that they may be helped a little on their way to the +enjoyment of art. + +HARVARD COLLEGE, _December tenth, 1902._ + + + +I + +THE PICTURE AND THE MAN + +At any exhibition of paintings, more particularly at some public +gallery or museum, one can hardly fail to reflect that an interest in +pictures is unmistakably widespread. People are there in +considerable numbers, and what is more striking, they seem to +represent every station and walk in life. It is evident that pictures, as +exhibited to the public, are not the cult of an initiated few; their +appeal is manifestly to no one class; and this popular interest is as +genuine as it is extended. + +Thus reflectively scanning the crowd, the observer asks himself: +What has attracted these numbers to that which might be supposed +not to be understood of the many? And what are the pictures that in +general draw the popular attention? + +A few persons have of course drifted into the exhibition out of +curiosity or from lack of something better to do. So much is evident +at once, for these file past the walls listlessly, seldom stopping, and +then but to glance at those pictures which are most obviously like +the familiar object they pretend to represent,--such as the bowl of +flowers which the beholder can almost smell, the theatre-checks and +five-dollar note pasted on a wall which tempt him to finger them, or +the panel of game birds which puzzles him to determine whether the +birds are real or not. These visitors, however, are not the most +numerous. With the great majority it is not enough that the picture +be a clever piece of imitation or illusion: transferring their interest +from the mere execution, they demand further that the subjects +represented shall be pleasing. The crowd pause before a sunny +landscape, with cows standing by the shaded pool; they gather about +the brilliant portrait of a woman splendidly arrayed,--a favorite +actress or a social celebrity; they linger before a group of children +wading in a brook, or a dog crouching mournfully by an empty +cradle. At length, with an approving and sympathetic word of +comment, they pass on to the next pleasing picture. Some canvases, +not the most popular ones, are yet not without their interest for a few; +these visitors are taking things a little more seriously; they do not try +to see every picture, they do not hurry; they seem to be considering +the canvas immediately before them with concentrated attention. + +No one of all these people is insensible to the appeal of the +picturesque: their presence at the exhibition is evidence of that. In +life they like to see a bowl of flowers, a sunny landscape, a beautiful +woman in beautiful surroundings; and naturally they are interested +in that which represents and recalls the reality. At once it is plain, +however, that to different individuals the various pictures appeal in +different measure and for differing reasons. To one the very fact of +representation is a mystery and fascination. To another the important +thing is the subject; the picture must represent what he likes in +nature or in life. To a third the subject itself is of less concern than +what the painter wanted to say about it: the artist saw a beauty +manifested by an ugly beggar, perhaps, and he wanted to show that +beauty to his fellows, who could not perceive it for themselves. + +The special interest in pictures of each of these three men is not +without its warrant in experience. What man is wholly indifferent to +the display of human skill? Who is there without his store of +pleasurable associations, who is not stirred by any call which rouses +them into play? What lover of beauty is not ever awake to the +revelation of new beauty? Indeed, upon these three principles +together, though in varying proportion, depends the full significance +of a great work of art. + +As the lover of pictures looks back over the period of his conscious +interest in exhibitions and galleries, it is not improbable that his +earliest memories attach themselves to those paintings which most +closely resembled the object represented. He remembers the great +wonder which he felt that a man with mere paint and canvas could +so reproduce the reality of nature. So it is that those paintings which +are perhaps the first to attract the man who feels an interest in +pictures awakening are such as display most obviously the painter's +skill. Whatever the subject imitated, the fascination remains; that +such illusion is possible at all is the mystery and the delight. + +But as his interest in pictures grows with indulgence, as his +experience widens, the beholder becomes gradually aware that he is +making a larger demand. After the first shock of pleasurable surprise +is worn away, he finds that the repeated exhibition of the painter's +dexterity ceases to satisfy him; these clever pieces of deception +manifest a wearying sameness, after all; and the beholder begins +now to look for something more than mere expertness. Thinking on +his experience, he concludes that the subjects which can be imitated +deceptively are limited in range and interest; he has a vague, +disquieting sense that somehow these pictures do not mean anything. +Yet he is puzzled. Art aims to represent, he tells himself, and it +should follow that the best art is that which represents most closely +and exactly. He recalls, perhaps, the legend of the two Greek +painters, one with his picture of the fruit which the birds flew down +to peck at, the other with his painting of a veil which deceived his +very rival. The imitative or "illusionist" picture pleads its case most +plausibly. A further experience of such pictures, however, fails to +bring the beholder beyond his simple admiration of the painter's skill; +and that skill, he comes gradually to realize, does not differ +essentially from the adroitness of the juggler who keeps a billiard +ball, a chair, and a silk handkerchief rotating from hand to hand. + +Conscious, then, of a new demand, of an added interest to be +satisfied, the amateur of pictures turns from the imitative canvas to +those paintings which appeal more widely to his familiar experience. +Justly, he does not here forgo altogether his delight in the painter's +cunning of hand, only he requires further that the subjects +represented shall be pleasing. It must be a subject whose meaning he +can recognize at once: a handsome or a strong portrait, a familiar +landscape, some little incident which tells its own story. The +spectator is now attracted by those pictures which rouse a train of +agreeable associations. He stops before a canvas representing a bit +of rocky coast, with the ocean tumbling in exhilaratingly. He +recognizes the subject and finds it pleasing; then he wonders where +the picture was painted. Turning to his catalogue, he reads: "37. On +the Coast of Maine." "Oh, yes," he says to himself, "I was on the +coast of Maine last summer, and I remember what a glorious time I +had sitting on the rocks of an afternoon, with some book or other +which the ocean was too fine to let me read. I like that picture." If +the title had read "Massachusetts Coast," it is to be feared he would +not have liked the canvas quite so well. The next picture which he +notices shows, perhaps, a stately woman sumptuously attired. It is +with a slight shock of disappointment that the visitor finds recorded +in his catalogue: "41. Portrait of a Lady." He could see that much for +himself. He hoped it was going to be the painter's mother or +somebody's wife,--a person he ought to know about. But the pictures +which appeal to him most surely are those which tell some little +story,--"The Lovers," "The Boy leaving Home," "The Wreck." Here +the subject, touching some one of the big human emotions, to which +no man is wholly insensible, calls out the response of immediate +interest and sympathy. It is something which he can understand. + +At length there comes a day when the visitor stops before a +landscape which seems to him more beautiful than anything he has +ever seen in nature; or some portrait discloses a strength of character +or radiates a charm of personality which he has seldom met with in +life. Whence comes this beauty, this strength, this graciousness? Can +it be that the painter has seen a new wonder in nature, a new +significance in human life? The spectator's previous experience of +pictures has familiarized him in some measure with the means of +expression which the painter employs. More sensitive now to the +appeal of color and form, he sees that what the artist cares to present +on his canvas is just his peculiar sense of the beauty in the world, a +beauty that is best symbolized and made manifest through the +medium of color and form. Before he understood this eloquent +language which the painter speaks, he misinterpreted those pictures +whose significance he mistook to be literary and not pictorial. He +early liked the narrative picture because here was a subject he could +understand; he could rephrase it in his own terms, he could retell the +story to himself in words. Now words are the means of expression of +every-day life. Because of this fact, the art which employs words as +its medium is the art which comes nearest to being universally +understood, namely, literature. The other arts use each a medium +which it requires a special training to understand. Without some +sense of the expressiveness of color, line, form, and sounds,--a sense +which can be cultivated,--one is necessarily unable to grasp the full +and true meaning of picture, statue, or musical composition. One +must realize further that the artist thinks and feels in his peculiar +medium; his special meaning is conceived and expressed in color or +form or sound. The task of the appreciator, correspondingly, is to +receive the artist's message in the same terms in which it was +conceived. The tendency is inevitable, however, to translate the +meaning of the work into words, the terms in which men commonly +phrase their experience. A parallel tendency is manifest in one's +efforts to learn a foreign language. The English student of French at +first thinks in English and laboriously translates phrase for phrase +into French; and in hearing or reading the foreign language, he +translates the original, word for word, into his native tongue before +he can understand its sense: he has mastered the language only when +he has reached that point where English is no longer present to his +consciousness: he thinks in French and understands in French. +Similarly, to translate the message of any art into terms that are +foreign to it, to phrase the meaning of music or painting, for +example, in words, is to fail of its essential, true significance. The +import of music is musical; the meaning of pictures is not literary +but pictorial. In the understanding of this truth, then, the spectator +penetrates to the artist's real intention; and he becomes aware that +when he used the picture as the peg whereon to hang his own +reflections and ideas, he missed the meaning of the artist's work. "As +I look at this canvas," he tells himself, "it is not what I know of the +coast of Maine that is of concern, but what the painter has seen and +felt of its beauty and wants to reveal to me." Able at last to interpret +the painter's medium, the appreciator comes to seek in pictures not +primarily an exhibition of the craftsman's skill, not even a recall of +his own pleasurable experiences, but rather, beyond all this, a fuller +visible revelation of beauty. + +The essential significance of art, that art is revelation, is illustrated +not only by painting but by the other arts as well. In music, to take +but a single example, are present the same elements that constitute +the appeal of pictures,--skill in the rendering, a certain +correspondence with experience, and the power of imaginative +interpretation of the facts of life. The music-hall performer who +wins the loudest and heartiest applause is he who does the greatest +number of pyrotechnic, wonderful things on the piano, or holds a +high note on the cornet for the longest time. His success, as with the +painter whose aim is to create illusion, rests upon men's instinctive +admiration for the exhibition of skill. Again, as the imitative picture +involves not only the display of dexterity, but also likeness to the +thing represented and the consequent possibility of recognizing it +immediately, so in the domain of music there is an order of +composition which seems to aim at imitation,--the so-called +"descriptive" music. A popular audience is delighted with the "Cats' +Serenade," executed on the violins with overwhelming likeness to +the reality, or with, the "Day in the Country," in which the sun rises +in the high notes, cocks crow, horses rattle down the road, +merrymakers frolic on the green, clouds come up in the horns, +lightning plays in the violins, thunder crashes in the drums and +cymbals, the merrymakers scatter in the whole orchestra, the storm +passes diminuendo, and in the muted violins the full moon rises +serenely into a twilight sky. Here the intention is easily understood; +the layman cannot fail to recognize what the composer wanted to +say. And as in the case of pictures which interest the beholder +because he can translate their subject into the terms which are his +own medium of expression, that is, words, so with descriptive music, +broadly speaking, the interest and significance is literary and not +musical. Still another parallel is presented. Just as those pictures are +popular whose subjects lie within the range of familiar experience, +such as cows by the shaded pool, or children playing, or whose +subjects touch the feelings; so, that music is popular which is +phrased in obvious and familiar rhythms such as the march and the +waltz, or which appeals readily and unmistakably to sentiment and +emotion. It is after the lover of music has traversed these passages of +musical expression and has proved their imitations that he comes to +seek in music new ranges of experience, unguessed-at possibilities +of feeling, which the composer has himself sounded and which he +would communicate to others. He is truly the artist only as he leads +his auditors into regions of beautiful living which they alone and of +themselves had not penetrated. For it is then that his work reveals. + +Only such pictures, too, will have a vital meaning as reveal. The +imitative and the iterative alike, that which adds nothing to the +object and that which adds nothing to the experience of the beholder, +though once pleasing, now fail to satisfy. The appreciator calls for +something fuller. He wants to pass beyond the object, beyond his +experience of it, into the realm of illumination whither the true artist +would lead him. The development of appreciation, as the amateur +has come to realize in his own person, is only the enlargement of +demand. The appreciator requires ever fresh revelations of beauty. +He discovers, too, that in practice the tendency of his development is +in the direction of exclusion. As he goes on, he cares for fewer and +fewer things, because those works which can minister to his +ever-expanding desire of beauty must needs be less numerous. But these +make up in largeness of utterance, in the intensity of their message, +what they lack in numbers. Nor does this outcome make against a +fancied catholicity of taste. The true appreciator still sees in his +earlier loves something that is good, and he values the good the +more justly that he sees it now in its right relation and apprehends its +real significance. As each in its turn led him to seek further, each +became an instrument in his development. For himself he has need +of them no longer. But far from contemning them, he is rightly +grateful for the solace they have afforded, as by them he has made +his way up into the fuller meaning of art. + + + +II + +THE WORK OF ART AS SYMBOL + +In the experience of the man who feels himself attracted to pictures +and who studies them intelligently and with sympathy, there comes +a day when suddenly a canvas reveals to him a new beauty in nature +or in life. Much seeing and much thinking, much bewilderment and +some disappointment, have taught him that in the appreciation of +pictures the question at issue is not, how cleverly has the painter +imitated his object, is not, how suggestive is the subject of pleasing +associations; he need simply ask himself, "What has the artist +conceived or felt in the presence of this landscape, this arrangement +of line and color, this human face, that I have not seen and felt, and +that he wants to communicate to me?" + +The incident of the single canvas, which by its illuminating +revealment first discloses to the observer the true significance of +pictures, is typical of the whole scope of art. The mission of art is to +reveal. It is the prophet's message to his fellow men, the apocalypse +of the seer. The artist is he to whom is vouchsafed a special +apprehension of beauty. He has the eye to see, the temperament to +feel, the imagination to interpret; it is by virtue of these capacities, +this high, transfiguring vision, that he is an artist; and his skill of +hand, his equipment with the means of expression, is incidental to +the great fact that he has somewhat to express that the common man +has not. To his work, the manifestation of his spirit in material form, +his perception made sensible, is accorded the name of art. + +Art is expression. It is not a display of skill; it is not the reproduction +of external forms or appearances; it does not even, as some say, +exist for itself: it is a message, a means. To cry "Art for Art's sake!" +is to converse with the echo. Such a definition but moves in a circle, +and doubles upon itself. No; art is for the artist's sake. The artist is +the agent or human instrument whereby the supreme harmony, +which is beauty, is manifested to men. Art is the medium by which +the artist communicates himself to his fellows; and the individual +work is the expression of what the artist felt or thought, as at the +moment some new aspect of the universal harmony was revealed to +his apprehension. Art is emotion objectified, but the object is +subordinated to the emotion as means is to an end. The material +result is not the final significance, but what of spiritual meaning or +beauty the artist desired to convey. Not what is painted, as the +layman thinks, not how it is painted, as the technician considers, but +why did the artist paint it, is the question which sums up the truth +about art. The appreciator need simply ask, What is the beauty, what +the idea, which the artist is striving to reveal by these symbols of +color and form? He understands that the import of the work is the +_idea,_ and that the work itself is beautiful because it symbolizes a +beautiful idea; its significance is spiritual. The function of art, then, +is through the medium of concrete, material symbols to reveal to +men whatever of beauty has been disclosed to the artist's more +penetrating vision. + +In order to seize the real meaning of art it is necessary to strip the +word beauty of all the wrappings of customary associations and the +accretions of tradition and habit. As the word is current in ordinary +parlance, the attribute of beauty is ascribed to that which is pleasing, +pretty, graceful, comely; in fine, to that which is purely agreeable. +But surely such is not the beauty which Rembrandt saw in the filthy, +loathsome beggar. To Rembrandt the beggar was expressive of some +force or manifestation of the supreme universal life, wherein all +things work together to a perfect harmony. Beauty is the essential +quality belonging to energy, character, significance. A merely +agreeable object is not beautiful unless it is expressive of a meaning; +whatever, on the other hand, is expressive of a meaning, however +shocking it may be in itself, however much it may fail to conform to +conventional standards, is beautiful. Beauty does not reside in the +object. No; it is the artist's sense of the great meaning of things; and +in proportion as he finds that meaning--the qualities of energy, force, +aspiration, life--manifest and expressed in objects do those objects +become beautiful. Such was the conception of beauty Keats had +when he wrote in a letter: "What the Imagination seizes as Beauty +must be Truth--whether it existed before or not,--for I have the same +idea of all our passions as of Love: they are all, in their sublime, +creative of essential Beauty." And similarly; "I can never feel certain +of any truth, but from a clear perception of its Beauty." It his verse +he sings:-- + + "'Beauty is truth, truth beauty,'--that is all + Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know." + +When it is said here, then, that the artist sees beauty in nature, the +phrase may be understood as a convenient but inexact formula, as +when one says the sun rises or the sun sets. Beauty is in the +landscape only in the sense that these material forms express for the +artist an idea he has conceived of some aspect of the universal life. + +The artist is impelled to embody concretely his perception of beauty, +and so to communicate his emotion, because the emotion wakened +by the perception of new harmony in things is most fully possessed +and enjoyed as it comes to expression. Thus to make real his ideal +and find the expression of himself is the artist's supreme Happiness. +A familiar illustration of the twin need and delight of expression +may be found in the handiwork produced in the old days when every +artisan was an artist. It may be, perhaps, a key which some +craftsman of Nuremberg fashioned. In the making of it he was not +content to stop with the key which would unlock the door or the +chest It was his key, the work of his hands; and he wrought upon it +lovingly, devotedly, and made it beautiful, finding in his work the +expression of his thought or feeling; it was the realization for that +moment of his ideal. His sense of pleasure in the making of it +prompted the care he bestowed upon it; his delight was in creation, +in rendering actual a new beau which it was given him to conceive. + +In its origin as a work of art the key does not differ from a landscape +by Inness, an "arrangement" by Whistler, a portrait by Sargent. The +artist, whether craftsman or painter, is deeply stirred by some +passage in his experience, a fair object or a true thought: it is the +imperious demand of his nature, as it is his supreme pleasure, to +give his feeling expression. The form which his expression takes--it +may be key or carpet, it may be statue, picture, poem, symphony, or +cathedral--is that which most closely responds to his idea, the form +which most truly manifests and represents it. + +All art, as the expression of the artist's idea, is in a certain definite +sense representative. Not that all art reproduces an external reality, +as it is said that painting or literature represents and music does not; +but every work of art, in painting, poetry, music, or in the handiwork +of the craftsman, _represents_ in that it is the symbol of the creator's +ideal. To be sure, the painter or sculptor or dramatist draws his +symbols from already existing material forms, and these symbols are +like objects in a sense in which music is not But line and color and +the life of man, apart from this resemblance to external reality, are +representative or symbolic of the artist's idea precisely as the +craftsman's key, the designer's pattern, or the musician's symphony. +The beautifully wrought key, the geometric pattern of oriental rug or +hanging, the embroidered foliation on priestly vestment, are works +of art equally with the landscape, the statue, the drama, or the +symphony, in that they are one and all the sensuous manifestation of +some new beauty spiritually conceived. + +The symbolic character of a work of art must not be lost from sight, +for it is the clue to the interpretation of pictures, as it is of all art. +The painter feels his way through the gamut of his palette to a +harmony of color just as truly as the musician summons the notes of +his scale and marshals them into accord. The painter is moved by +some sweep of landscape; it wakens in him an emotion. When he +sets himself to express his emotion in the special medium with +which he works, he represents by pigment the external aspect of the +landscape, yes; but not in order to imitate it or reproduce it: he +represents the landscape because the colors and the forms which he +registers upon the canvas express for him the emotions roused by +those colors and those forms in nature. He does not try to match his +grays with nature's grays, but this nuance which he gropes for on his +palette, and having found it, touches upon his canvas, expresses for +him what that particular gray in nature made him feel. His one +compelling purpose is in all fidelity and singleness of aim to +"translate the impression received." The painter's medium is just as +symbolic as the notes of the musician's nocturne or the words of the +poet's sonnet, equally inspired by the hour and place. Color and line +and form, although they happen to be the properties of _things,_ +have a value for the emotions as truly as musical sounds: they are +the outward symbol of the inward thought or feeling, the visible +bodying forth of the immaterial idea. + +The symbolic character of the material world is not early +apprehended. In superficial reaction upon life, men do not readily +pass beyond the immediate actuality. That the spiritual meaning of +all things is not perceived, that all things are not seen to be beautiful, +or expressive of the supreme harmony, is due to men's limited +powers of sight and feeling. Therefore is it that the artist is given in +order that he may reveal as yet unrealized spiritual relations, or new +beauty. The workaday world with its burden of exigent "realities" +has need of a Carlyle to declare that things are but a wonderful +metaphor and the physical universe is the garment of the living God. +In the realm of thought an Emerson, seer of transcendent vision, +must come to restore his fellows to their birthright, which is the life +of the spirit. As in life, so in art men do not easily pass the obvious +and immediate. The child reads "Gulliver's Travels" or "The +Pilgrim's Progress" for the story. As his experience of life both +widens and deepens, he is able to see through externals, and he +penetrates to the real significance, of which the narrative is but the +symbol. So it is with an insight born of experience that the lover of +art sees no longer the "subject," but the beauty which the subject is +meant to symbolize. + +In the universal, all-embracing constitution of things, nothing is +without its significance. To be aware that everything has a meaning +is necessary to the understanding of art, as indeed of life itself. That +meaning, which things symbolize and express, it cannot be said too +often, is not necessarily to be phrased in words. It is a meaning for +the spirit. A straight line affects one differently from a curve; that is, +each kind of line means something. Every line in the face utters the +character behind it; every movement of the body is eloquent of the +man's whole being. "The expression of the face balks account," says +Walt Whitman, + + "But the expression of a well-made man appears not only in his + face, + It is in his limbs and joints also, it is curiously in the joints + of his hips and wrists, + It is in his walk, the carriage of his neck, the flex of his waist + and knees, dress does not hide him, + The strong sweet quality he has strikes through the cotton and + broadcloth, + To see him pass conveys as much as the best poem, perhaps more, + You linger to see his back, and the back of his neck and + shoulder-side." + +Crimson rouses a feeling different from that roused by yellow, and +gray wakens a mood different from either. In considering this +symbolic character of colors it is necessary to distinguish between +their value for the emotions and merely literary associations. That +white stands for purity or blue for fidelity is a conventionalized and +attached conception. But the pleasure which a man has in some +colors or his dislike for others depends upon the effect each color +has upon his emotions, and this effect determines for him the +symbolic value of the color. In the same way sounds are symbolic in +that they affect the emotions apart from associated "thoughts." Even +with a person who has no technical knowledge of music, the effect +of the minor key is unmistakably different from the major. The tones +and modulations of the voice, quite apart from the words uttered, +have an emotional value and significance. Everything, line, form, +gesture, movement, color, sound, all the material world, is +expressive. All objective forms have their meaning, and rightly +perceived are, in the sense in which the word is used here, beautiful, +in that they represent or symbolize a spiritual idea. + +Thus it is that beauty is not in the object but in man's sense of the +object's symbolic expressiveness. The amateur may be rapt by some +artist's "quality of color." But it is probable that in the act of laying +on his pigment, the artist was not thinking of his "quality" at all, but, +rapt himself by the perception of the supreme harmony at that +moment newly revealed to his sense, he was striving sincerely and +directly to give his feeling its faithfullest expression. His color is +beautiful because his idea was beautiful. The expression is of the +very essence of the thought; it _is_ the thought, but the thought +embodied. "Coleridge," says Carlyle, "remarks very pertinently +somewhere that whenever you find a sentence musically worded, of +true rhythm and melody in the words, there is something deep and +good in the meaning, too. For body and soul, word and idea, go +strangely together here as everywhere." Not to look beyond the +material is to miss the meaning of the work. + +In an art such as music, in which form and content are one and +inextricable, it is not difficult to understand that the medium of +expression which the art employs is necessarily symbolic, for here +the form cannot exist apart from the meaning to be conveyed. In the +art of literature, however, the case is not so clear, for the material +with which the poet, the novelist, the dramatist works, material +made up of the facts of the world about us, we are accustomed to +regard as objective realities. An incident is an incident, the +inevitable issue of precedent circumstances, and that's all there is to +it Character is the result of heredity, environment, training, plus the +inexplicable _Ego._ To regard these facts of life which are so actual +and immediate as a kind of animate algebraic formulae seems +absurd, but absurd only as one is unable to penetrate to the inner +meaning of things. "Madame Bovary," to take an example quite at +random, is called a triumph of realism. Now realism, of all literary +methods, should register the fact as it is, and least of all should +concern itself with symbols. But this great novel is more than the +record of one woman's life. Any one who has come to understand +the character and temperament of Flaubert as revealed in his Letters +must feel that "Madame Bovary" is no arbitrary recital of tragic +incident, but those people who move through his pages, what they +do and what goes on about them, expressed for Flaubert his own +dreary, baffled rebellion against life. That the artist may consciously +employ the facts of life, not for the sake of the fact, but to +communicate his feeling by thus bodying it forth in concrete +symbols, there is explicit testimony. In an essay dealing with his +own method of composition, Poe writes: "I prefer commencing with +the consideration of an _effect._ Keeping originality _always_ in +view . . . I say to myself, in the first place, 'of the innumerable +effects or impressions of which the heart, the intellect, or (more +generally) the soul is susceptible, what one shall I, on the present +occasion, select?' Having chosen a novel first, and secondly, a vivid +effect, I consider whether it can be best wrought by incident or +tone . . . afterwards looking about me (or rather within) for such +combinations of event or tone as shall best aid me in the +construction of the effect." Yes, physical circumstances, the +succession of incident, shifting momentary grouping of persons, +traits of character in varied combination and contrast,--all these are +significant for the literary artist of spiritual relations. + +As the symbol of what the artist feels and strives to express, the +individual work of art is necessarily more than any mere transcript +of fact. It is the meeting and mingling of nature and the spirit of man; +the result of their union is fraught with the inheritance of the past +and holds within it the limitless promise of the future. The work of +art is a focus, gathering into itself all the stored experience of the +artist, and radiating in turn so much to the beholder as he is able at +the moment to receive. A painter is starting out to sketch. Through +underbrush and across the open he pushes his way, beset by beauty +on every side, and storing impressions, sensations, thoughts. At last +his eye lights upon some clump of brush, some meadow or hill, +which seems at the instant to sum up and express his accumulated +experience. In rendering this bit of nature, he pours out upon his +canvas his store of feeling. It is the single case which typifies his +entire course. "The man's whole life preludes the single deed." His +way through the world has been just such a gathering up of +experience, and each new work which he produces is charged with +the collected wealth of years. + +The special work is the momentary epitome of the artist's total +meaning. He finds this brief passage in nature beautiful then and +there because it expresses what he feels and means. He does not try +to reproduce the thing, but uses the thing for what it signifies. The +thing is but for that moment: it signifies all that has gone before. As +he watches, a cloud passes over the sun and the face of nature is +darkened. Suddenly the scene bursts into light again. In itself the +landscape is no brighter than before the sun was darkened. The +painter feels it brighter for the contrast, and inevitably his rendering +of its aspect is heightened and intensified. + +Art is nature heightened and intensified as nature is interpreted +through the transfiguring medium of the human spirit To the object +is added + + "The gleam, + The light that never was on sea or land, + The consecration and the poet's dream." + +After an early morning in the fields, Corot withdraws to his house to +rest. "I dream of the morning landscape," he writes; "I dream my +picture, and presently I will paint my dream." But not only does the +artist render the beauty which this landscape happens to express for +him: he charges these colors and forms with the beauty of all +landscape. Corot painted _at_ Ville d'Avray; _what_ he painted +was God's twilight or dawn enwrapping tree and pool. In gratitude +and worship he revealed to men the tender, ineffable poetry of gray +dawns in all places and for all time. Millet's peasants were called +John and Peter and Charles, and they tilled the soil of France; but on +their bowed shoulders rests the universal burden; these dumb figures +are eloquent of the uncomplaining, hopeless "peasanthood" of the +world. In the actual to discern the ideal, in the appearance to +penetrate to the reality, without taking leave of the material to reveal +the spiritual,--this is the mystery and vocation of the artist, and his +achievement is art. + + + +III + +THE WORK OF ART AS BEAUTIFUL + +Just as nature and life are significant as the material manifestation of +spiritual forces and relations, so a work of art is in its turn the +symbol by which the artist communicates himself; it is his revelation +to men of the beauty he has perceived and felt. + +Beauty is not easy to define. That conception which regards beauty +as the power to awaken merely agreeable emotions is limited and in +so far false. Another source of misunderstanding is the confusion of +beauty with moralistic values. It is said that beauty is the Ideal; and +by many the "Ideal" is taken to mean ideal goodness. With +righteousness and sin as such beauty has no concern. Much that is +evil in life, much that offends against the moral law, must be +regarded as beautiful in so far as it plays its necessary part in the +universal whole. Clearing away these misconceptions, then, an +approximate definition would be that the essence of beauty is +harmony. So soon as a detail is shown in its relation to a whole, then +it becomes beautiful because it is expressive of the supreme unity. A +discord in music is felt to be a discord only as it is isolated; when it +takes its fitting and inevitable place in the large unity of the +symphony, it becomes full of meaning. The hippopotamus, dozing +in his tank at the Zoo, is wildly grotesque and ugly. But who shall +say that, seen in the fastnesses of his native rivers, he is not the +beautiful perfect fulfilling of nature's harmony? To a race of blacks, +the fair-skinned Apollo appearing among them could not but be +monstrous. The smoking factory, sordid and hideous, is beautiful to +him who sees that it accomplishes a necessary function in the great +scheme of life. Beauty is adaptation. Whatever is truly useful is in so +far truly beautiful. The steam engine and the battleship are beautiful +just as truly as Titian's Madonna, glorified and sweeping upward +into the presence of God the Father. Only what is vital and +serviceable, and whatever is that, is beautiful. + +When the spirit of man perceives a unity in things, a working +together of parts, there beauty exists. It resides in the synthesis of +details to the end of shaping a complete whole. This perception, this +synthesis, is a function of the human mind. Beauty is not in the +landscape, but in the intelligence which apprehends it. Evidence of +this fundamental truth is the fact that the same landscape is more +"beautiful" to one man than to another, or to a third, perhaps, is not +beautiful at all. It is only as the individual perceives a relation +among the parts resulting in a total unity that the object becomes +beautiful for him. + +This abstract exposition may be made clearer by a graphic +illustration. Here are four figures composed of the same elements:-- + + * *** ** * *** + * ***** * ****** + * ** * * * * + * + ************* * + * * * * + ** + Fig. I. + +* * * * * * * * +* * * * * * * * +* * * * * * * * +* * * * * * * * +* * * * * * * * +Fig. II. Fig. III. Fig. IV. + +Figure I., far from being pleasing, is positively disquieting. With the +other three figures, the perception of their form is attended with a +kind of pleasure. Whereas the first figure is without form and is +meaningless, each of the second group exhibits harmony, balance, +proportion, interrelation of parts: each is perceived to be a whole. +Although experience itself comes to men in fragments and +seemingly without order, yet the human mind is so constituted as to +require that an idea or a truth be shown to be a whole before the +mind can comprehend it In considering the element of balance, it +should be noted, as illustrated by Figure IV., that balance is not +necessarily perfect symmetry. A Gothic cathedral is beautiful no less +than a Greek temple. In a painting of a landscape, for example, it is +necessary simply that the masses and the tones stand in balancing +relation; the perfect symmetry of geometric exactness, characteristic +of Hellenic and Renaissance art, is not required. In the work which +embodies the artist's perception of the universal harmony, there must +be rhythm, order, unity in variety; so framed it becomes expressive +and significant + +As the symbol of beauty, the work of art is itself beautiful in that it +manifests in itself that wholeness and integrity which is beauty. +Every work of art is informed by a controlling design; it +subordinates manifold details to a definite whole; it reduces and +adjusts its parts to an all-inclusive, perceptible unity. The +Nuremberg key must have some sort of rhythm; the rug or vestment +must exhibit a pattern which can be seen to be a whole; the canvas +must show balance in the composition, and the color must be "in +tone." In any work of art there must be design and purpose. + +In nature there is much which to the limited perception of men does +not appear to be beautiful, for there is much that does not manifest +superficially the necessary harmony. The landscape at noonday +under the blaze of the relentless sun discloses many things which are +seemingly incongruous with one another. The dull vision of men +cannot penetrate to the unity underlying it all. At twilight, as the +shadows of evening wrap it round, the same landscape is invested +with mysterious beauty. Conflicting details are lost, harsh outlines +are softened and merged, discordant colors are mellowed and +attuned. Nature has brought her field and hill and clustered +dwellings into "tone." So the artist, who has perceived a harmony +where the common eye saw it not, selects; he suppresses here, +strengthens there, fuses, and brings all into unity. + +Harmony wherever perceived is beauty. Beauty made manifest by +the agency of the human spirit is art. Art, in order to reveal this +harmony to men, must work through selection, through rejection and +emphasis, through interpretation. It is not difficult to understand, +then, that the exact reproduction of the facts of the external world is +not in a true sense art. + +The photograph, which is the most exact method of reproducing +outward aspect, is denied the title of a work of art; that is, the +photograph direct, which has not been retouched. To be sure, the +photograph is the product of a mechanical process, and is not, except +incidentally, the result of human skill. Another kind of reproduction +of outward aspect, however, virtually exact, which does show the +evidence of human skill, is yet not entitled to rank as art,--the +imitative or deceptive picture. Photograph and picture are ruled out +equally on the one count. Neither selects. + +In an exhibition of paintings were once displayed two panels +precisely similar in appearance, presenting an army coat and cap, a +sabre and a canteen. At a distance there was no point of difference in +the two. A nearer view disclosed the fact that on one panel the +objects were real and that the other panel was painted. The beholder +was pleased by the exhibition of the painter's skill; but in so far as +the work did not reveal a significance or beauty in these objects +which the artist had seen and the beholder had not, it fell short of +being a work of art Just as the key of the Nuremberg craftsman was +a work of art in that it was for him the expression, the rendering +actual, of a new beauty it was given him to conceive, so only that is +art which makes manifest a beauty that is new, a beauty that is truly +born of the artist's own spirit. The repetition of existing forms with +no modification by the individual workman is not creation, but +imitation; and imitation is manufacture, not art. Inasmuch as the two +panels could not be distinguished, the presentment signified no more +than the reality. Tried as a work of art, the imitative picture, in +common with the photograph, lacks the necessary element of +interpretation, of revelation. That the representation may become art, +there must be added to it some new attribute or quality born of the +artist's spirit. The work must take on new meaning. + +As lending his work significance of an obvious sort, a significance +not necessarily "pictorial," the painter might see in the objects some +story they have to tell. The plaster of the garret wall where they are +hanging he may show to be cracked; that tear in the coat speaks of +faithful service, but the coat hangs limp and dusty now; the +inscription on the canteen is almost obliterated, and the strap is +broken; the sabre, which shows the marks of stern usage along its +blade, is spotted with rust: the whole composition means Trusty +Servants in Neglect. By the emphasis of certain aspects he picture is +made to signify more than he mere objects themselves, wherein +there was nothing salient. The meaning is imposed upon them or +drawn out of them by he artist. Or again, the painter may see in +these things the expression for him of a harmony which he can +manifest by the arrangement of line and color, and he so disposes his +material as to make that harmony visible. It is, then, not the crude +fact which the artist transcribes, but rather some feeling he has +toward the fact. By selection, by adjustment, he gives this special +aspect of the fact emphasis and relief. In virtue of his interpretation +the picture acquires a significance that is new; it gives the beholder a +pleasure which the fact itself did not give, and thus it passes over +into the domain of art. + +The purpose of art is not the reproduction of a beautiful object, but +the expression in objective form of a beautiful idea. A plaster cast of +a hand, however comely the hand may be, is not a work of art. As +with the photograph, the work involves only incidentally the +exercise of human skill. But that is not all. In order to render the +work in the spirit of art, the sculptor must model, not the hand, but +his sense of the hand; he must draw out and express its character, its +significance. To him it is not a certain form in bone and flesh; to him +it means grace, delicacy, sensitiveness, or perhaps resolution, +strength, force. As the material symbol of his idea of the hand, he +will select and make salient such lines and contours as are +expressive to him of that character. + +Indeed, so little depends upon the exact subject represented and so +much upon the artist's feeling toward it, so much depends upon the +spirit of the rendering, that the representation of a subject +uninteresting or even "ugly" in itself may be beautiful. In the art of +literature, the _subject_ is drawn from the life of man. The material +of the poem, the novel, the drama, is furnished by man's total +experience, the sum of his sensations, impressions, emotions, and +the events in which he is concerned. But experience crowds in upon +him at every point, without order and without relation; the daily +round of living is for most men a humdrum thing. Yet it is just this +rudimentary and undistinguished mass of experience which is +transmuted into literature; by the alchemy of art the representation +of that which is without interest becomes interesting. And it happens +on this wise. Life is humdrum only in so far as it is meaningless; +men can endure any amount drudgery and monotony provided that it +lead somewhere, that they perceive its relation to a larger unity +which is the total of life. As part of a whole which can be +apprehended, immediately it acquires purpose and becomes +significant. It is the sense of meaning in life which gives color and +warmth to the march of uniform days. So the literary artist shapes +his inchoate material to a definite end; out of the limitless complex +details at his command, he selects such passages of background, +such incidents, and such traits of character as make for the setting +forth of the idea he has conceived. Clearly the artist cannot use +everything, clearly he does not aim to reproduce the fact: there are +abridgments and suppressions, as there are accent and emphasis. The +finished work is a composite, embodying what is essential of many, +many preliminary studies and sketches, wrought and compiled with +generous industry. The master is recognized in what he omits; what +is suppressed is felt but not perceived: the great artist, in the result, +steps from peak to peak. + + "The Sun's rim dips; the stars rush out: + At one stride comes the Dark." + +Thus with three strokes the master Coleridge depicts the onrush of +the night over boundless spaces of sky and sea. Within the compass +of a few lines, Tennyson registers the interminable, empty monotony +of weary years: + + "No sail from day to day, but every day + The sunrise broken into scarlet shafts + Among the palms and ferns and precipices; + The blaze upon the waters to the east; + The blaze upon his island overhead; + The blaze upon the waters to the west; + Then the great stars that globed themselves in Heaven, + The hollower-bellowing ocean, and again + The scarlet shafts of sunrise--but no sail." + +Thus through selection does the artist work to interpretation. By +detaching the eternal meaning from the momentary fact, by +embodying his sense of its significance in such concrete forms as +symbolize his idea, by investing the single instance with universally +typical import, then in very truth he represents. Nature is not the +subject of art; she is the universal treasury from whose infinitely +various store the artist selects his symbols. + +A special method in art may here suggest itself as having for its +purpose to reproduce the fact in perfect fidelity; the method is called +_realism._ But a moment's considerate analysis shows that realism is +only a label for one manner of handling, and in the end comes no +nearer the object as it "really" is. In its essence realism is the artist's +personal vision of the fact, exactly as idealism or romanticism or +impressionism is personal. For after all, what is the reality? A +chance newsboy is offering his papers on a crowded street corner. +The fine lady recoils from his filth and from all contact with him; +the philanthropist sees in him a human being to help and to redeem; +the philosopher regards him dispassionately as a "social factor," the +result of heredity and environment; the artist cries out in joy as his +eye lights upon good stuff to paint. But all the while, which of these +conceptions figures the "real" newsboy? Not one. For he is all these +together; and the single observer, whatever his bias, cannot +apprehend him at every point. Any attempt to represent him involves +selection and interpretation, the suppression of some traits in order +to emphasize others, which are the special aspects that have +impressed the given observer. So there is no essential realism. The +term applies to the method of those who choose to render what is +less comforting in life, who insist on those characteristics of things +which men call ugly. In realism, just as truly as in any other kind of +treatment, is expressed the personality of the artist, his own peculiar +way of envisaging the world. + +A work of art is born of the artist's desire to express his joy in some +new aspect of the universal harmony which has been disclosed to +him. The mission of art is through interpretation to reveal. It +happens sometimes that a visitor at an exhibition of paintings is +shocked by a picture which seems to him for the moment impossible, +because so far beyond the range of his experience; yet withal he +finds himself attracted by it and he returns to study it. It is not many +days before his glance is arrested by that very effect in nature, and +he says, "Why, that is like that picture!" It was the artist who first +saw it and who taught him to see it for himself. When one observes +an effect in nature or in life that one calls "a Corot" or "a Whistler," +one means that to Corot or to Whistler is due the glory of +discovering that fuller beauty and revealing it. Browning makes Fra +Lippo Lippi say: + + "We're made so that we love + First when we see them painted, things we have passed + Perhaps a hundred times nor cared to see; + And so they are better, painted--better to us, + Which is the same thing. Art was given for that." + +This revealing power of art is not restricted to the individual +appreciator. It is said that the French are an artistic people and that +Americans are not. The explanation is that for generations the artists +of France have been discovering to their countrymen the beauty that +is around them at their very door, and have taught them to appreciate +it. The Americans will be an artistic people when our artists shall +have done the like for us. When there shall have been for +generations a truly native American art, there will be a public to +understand and to appreciate. So it is that everywhere the high +function of art is to reveal. As a friend, more sensitive and more +enthusiastic, with whom we are strolling, points out to us many +beauties by the wayside or in trees and sky, so the artist takes us by +the hand and leads us out into life, indicating for us a harmony to +which we were blind before. Burdened with affairs and the daily +round, we had not thought to look off and out to the spreading +meadows tossing into hills which roll upward into the blue heaven +beyond. + +The beauty thus revealed is a beauty which the artist has +apprehended in spirit and which he would make actual. A work of +art is the expression of an aspiration. The crude and tawdry images +of the Madonna Set in the roadside cross are just as truly a work of +art as the rapt saints of Giotto or the perfect Madonnas of Raphael in +so far as they are expressive of what those poor, devout souls who +fashioned them felt of worship and of love. After all, the difference +is that Giotto felt more than they, Raphael was endowed with more +accomplished powers of expression. The work receives its import as +it is the faithful utterance of him who shaped it, as it is genuinely the +realization of his ideal. "The gift without the giver is bare." But it is +no less true that the gift without the receiver is sterile and void, for +art involves not only its creator's intention but also its message to +him whom the work reaches. In a book, it is not only what the writer +says that makes its significance but also what the reader thinks as he +reads. In so far as any man finds in picture or poem or song a new +beauty, a fuller sense of harmony than was his before, for him that is +a work of art. + +Thus the standard by which art is to be tried is relative. For its +creator, the work is art in that it embodies a perception of new +harmony that is peculiarly his. In the material result, this special +character is imparted to the work by the artist's instinctive selection. +No two painters, though equipped with equal technical skill and +perhaps of like tastes and preferences, would or indeed could render +the same sweep of landscape in precisely similar fashion. Obviously, +to set down everything were at once an impossibility and an untruth, +for the detail of nature is infinite and the beholder does not see +everything. Each is bound to select such details as impress him, and +his selection will be determined by the way in which he as a unique +personality, an individual different from every other man in the +whole wide universe, feels about the bit of nature before him. In +expressing by his special medium what he feels about the landscape, +he aims, in the selection of material form and color, to detach and +render visible what of essential truth the landscape means to him, to +purge it of accidents, and register its eternal beauty. The painter will +not attempt, then, to reproduce the physical facts of nature,--the +topography, geology, botany, of the landscape,--but rather through +those facts in terms of color and form he tries to render its +_expression:_ its quality, as brilliance, tenderness; its mood, as joy, +mystery, setting down those salient aspects of it which combine to +give it character and meaning. For landscape--to recall the +exposition of a preceding page--has its expression as truly as the +human face. A man knows his friends not by the shape of the nose +or the color of the eyes, but by the character which these features +express, the personality which shines in the face and radiates from it +This effluence of the soul within is the essential man; people call it +the "expression." As with human life, so with the many aspects of +nature. External traits are merged in the spiritual meaning. The +material forms have the power of affecting the spirit thus or so; and +in man's reaction on his universe they come to take on a symbolic +emotional significance. Each manifestation of nature arouses in the +artist, more or less consciously on his part, some feeling toward it: +he cares, then, to represent these external material forms, whether a +flower, a landscape, a human face, only because there is in them +something in which he delights; he fashions the work of art in praise +of the thing he loves. To the clever technician who imitatively paints +the flower as he knows it to be, + + "A primrose on the river's brim + A yellow primrose is to him + And it is nothing more." + +But to the artist + + "The meanest flower that blows can give + Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears." + +And it is these thoughts that he cares to express and not the visible +truth about the flower. A writer was walking along the streets of +Paris on a day in early March. + +"It was dark and rather cold. I was gloomy, and walked because I +had nothing to do. I passed by some flowers placed breast-high upon +a wall. A jonquil in bloom was there. It is the strongest expression of +desire: it was the first perfume of the year. I felt all the happiness +destined for man. This unutterable harmony of souls, the phantom of +the ideal world, arose in me complete. I never felt anything so great +or so instantaneous. I know not what shape, what analogy, what +secret of relation it was that made me see in this flower a limitless +beauty. . . . I shall never enclose in a conception this power, this +immensity that nothing will express; this form that nothing will +contain; this ideal of a better world which one feels, but which it +would seem that nature has not made." + +And if Sénancour had set himself to paint his jonquil as he has +written about it, how that tender flower would have been +transfigured and glorified! + +What the artist aims to render is not the rose but the beauty of the +rose, his sense of one chord in the universal harmony which the rose +sounds for him, not that only, but the beauty of all roses that ever +were or ever shall be; and inevitably he will select such colors and +such lines as bring that special and interpreted beauty into relief, and +so make manifest to the beholder what was revealed to his own +higher vision, by virtue of which, and not because of any +exceptional technical skill, he is an artist. + + + +IV + +ART AND APPRECIATION + +It may be that some reader of the foregoing pages will attempt to +apply the principles therein set forth to the pictures shown in the +next exhibition he happens to attend. It is more than probable that in +his first efforts he will be disappointed. For the principles discussed +have dealt with art in its authentic manifestations; and not every +painter is an artist, not every picture is a work of art. + +At the very outset it should be said that an exhibition of paintings as +ordinarily made up is confusing and wholly illogical. We may +suppose that a volume to be read through in one sitting of two hours +is placed in the hands of an intelligent reader. The book consists of +essays, poems, short stories, and dramatic dialogue, each within the +compass of a few pages, each contributed by a different writer as an +example of his work for the year. We may suppose now that the +reader is asked to gather from this volume, read hastily and either +superficially or in random bits, some idea of the significance of each +author and of the import and scope of contemporary American +literature. Is it a fair test? This volume, we may further suppose, is +practically the only means by which the writer can get his work +before the public. A public means a purchaser, and of course the +writer must live. Is it reasonable to think that every number +contributed to such a volume will be a work of art, wrought with +singleness of heart and in loving devotion to an ideal? There are still +with us those who "work for money" and those who "work for +fame." There are those who believe in "giving the public what it +wants," and the numbers they contribute to the yearly volumes are +samples of the sort of thing they do, from which the public may +order. In the table of contents stand celebrated names; and to the +work of such men, perhaps, will turn the seeker after what he thinks +ought to be the best, not realizing that these are the men who have +known how to "give the people what they want," that the people do +not always want the good and right thing, and that it is somewhat the +habit of genius to dispense with contemporary recognition. If there +is here or there in the book an essay or a poem the product of +thought and effort and offered in all seriousness, how little chance it +has of being appreciated, except by a few, even if it is remarked at +all in the jumble of miscellaneous contributions. + +This hypothetical volume is a fair parallel of an annual exhibition of +paintings. In such an exhibition the number of works of art, the true, +inevitable expression of a new message, is relatively small. The +most celebrated and most popular painters are not necessarily by +that fact great artists, or indeed artists at all. Contemporary judgment +is notoriously liable to go astray. The gods of one generation are +often the laughing stock of the next; the idols of the fathers are torn +down and trampled under foot by the children. Some spirits there +have been of liberal promise who have not been able to withstand +the demands made upon them by early popular approval. Such is the +struggle and soul's tragedy which is studied convincingly in Mr. +Zangwill's novel, "The Master." No assault on the artist's integrity is +so insidious as immediate favor, which in its turn begets the fatal +desire to please. + +To the "successful" painters, however, are for the most part accorded +the places of honor on academy walls. The canvases of these men +are seen first by the visitor; but they are not all. There are other +pictures which promise neither better nor worse. Here are paintings +of merit, good in color and good in drawing, but empty of any +meaning. Scattered through the exhibition are the works of a group +of able men, imitating themselves, each trying to outdo the others by +a display of cleverness in solving some "painter's problem" or by +some startling effect of subject or handling. But it is a sad day for +any artist when he ceases to find his impulse and inspiration either +in his own spirit or in nature, and when he looks to his fellow +craftsmen for the motive of his work. Again, there are pictures by +men who, equipped with adequate technical skill, have caught the +manner of a master, and mistaking the manner for the message it +was simply intended to express, they degrade it into a mannerism +and turn out a product which people do not distinguish from the +authentic utterances of the master. The artist is a seer and prophet, +the channel of divine influences: the individual painter, sculptor, +writer, is a very human being. + +As he looks over these walls, clamorous of the commonplace and +the commercial, the seeker after what is good and true in art realizes +how very few of these pictures have been rendered in the spirit of +love and joy. The painter has one eye on his object and one eye on +the public; and too often, as a distinguished actor once said of the +stage manager whose vision is divided between art and the box +office, the painter is a one-eyed man. + +A painter once refused to find anything to interest him, still less to +move him, in a silent street with a noble spire detaching itself +vaguely from the luminous blue depths of a midnight sky, because, +he said, "People won't buy dark things, so what's the use? You might +as well do bright, pretty things that they will buy, and that are just as +easy to make." A portrait-painter gives up landscape subjects +because, as he does not hesitate to declare, it hurts his business. And +the painters themselves are not altogether to blame for this attitude +towards their work. The fault lies half with the people who buy +pictures, having the money, and who have not a gleam of +understanding of the meaning of art. A woman who had ordered her +house to be furnished and decorated expensively, remarked +to a caller who commented on a water-color hanging in the +drawing-room: "Yes, I think it matches the wall-paper very nicely." When +such is the purpose of those who paint pictures and such is the +understanding of those who buy them, it is not surprising that not +every picture is inevitably a work of art. + +But what is the poor seeker after art to do? The case is by no means +hopeless. In current exhibitions a few canvases strike a new note; +and by senses delicately attuned this note can be distinguished +within the jangle of far louder and popular tunes ground out, as it +were, by the street-piano. Seriously to study contemporary painting, +however, the logical opportunity is furnished by the exhibitions of +the works of single men or of small groups. As the reader who +wishes to understand an author or perhaps a school does not content +himself with random extracts, but instead isolates the man for the +moment and reads his work consecutively and one book in its +relation to his others; so the student of pictures can appreciate the +work and understand the significance of a given painter only as he +sees a number of his canvases together and in relation. So, he is able +to gather something of the man's total meaning. + +Widely different from annual exhibitions, too, are galleries and +museums; for here the proportion of really good things is +immeasurably larger. In the study of masterpieces, it need hardly be +said, the amateur may exercise judgment and moderation. He should +not try to do too much at one time, for he can truly appreciate only +as he enters fully into the spirit of the work and allows it to possess +him. To achieve this sympathy and understanding within the same +hour for more than a very few great works is manifestly impossible. +Such appreciation involves fundamentally a quick sensitiveness to +the appeal and the variously expressive power of color and line and +form. To win from the picture its fullest meaning, the observer may +bring to bear some knowledge of the artist who produced it and of +the age and conditions in which he lived. But in the end he must +surrender himself to the work of art, bringing to it his intellectual +equipment, his store of sensuous and emotional experience, his +entire power of being moved. + +For when all is said, there is no single invariable standard by which +to try a work of art: its significance to the appreciator rests upon his +capacity at the moment to receive it. "A jest's prosperity lies in the +ear of him that hears it." The appreciator need simply ask himself, +"What has this work to reveal to me of beauty that I have not +perceived for myself? I shall not look for the pretty and the +agreeable. But what of new significance, energy, life, has this work +to express to me? I will accept no man entirely and unquestioningly, +I will condemn no one unheard. No man has the whole truth; every +man has some measure of the truth, however small. Let it be my task +to find it and to separate it from what is unessential and false. In my +search for what is true, I will conserve my integrity and maintain my +independence. And I shall recognize my own wherever I may find +it." + +"Man is the measure of all things," declared an ancient philosopher. +And his teaching has not been superseded to-day. The individual is +the creator of his own universe; he is the focus of the currents and +forces of his world. The meaning of all things is subjective. So the +measure of beauty in life for a man is determined by his capacity to +receive and understand. Thus it is that a man's joy in experience and +his appreciation of art in any of its manifestations are conditioned by +the opportunity that nature or art furnishes for his spirit to exercise +itself. In the reading of poetry, for example, we seek the expression +of ourselves. Our first emotion is, perhaps, a simple, unreflecting +delight, the delight which a butterfly must feel among the flowers or +that of a child playing in the fields under the warm sun; it is a +delight wholly physical,--pure sensation. A quick taking of the +breath, the escape of a sigh, inarticulate and uncritical, are the only +expression we can find at that instant for what we feel: as when an +abrupt turn of the road spreads out before us a landscape of which +we had not dreamed, or we enter for the first time the presence of +the Apollo Belvedere. We know simply that we are pleased. But +after nerves have ceased to tingle so acutely, we begin to think; and +we seek to give account to ourselves of the beauty which for the +moment we could but feel. Once arrived at the attitude of reflection, +we find that the poetry which affects us most and to which we +oftenest return is the poetry that contains the record of our own +experience, but heightened, the poetry which expresses our desires +and aspirations, that in which we recognize ourselves elevated and +idealized. In so far as we see in it the ennobled image of our own +nature, so far it has power to hold us and to stir us. + +An elementary manifestation of the tendency to seek in art the +record of our own experience is seen in the popularity of those +pictures whose subjects are familiar and can be immediately +recognized. On a studio wall was once hanging a "Study of Brush," +showing the play of sunlight through quivering leaves. A visitor +asked the painter why he did not put some chickens in the +foreground. To her the canvas was meaningless, for she had never +seen, had never really seen, the sunlight dancing on burnished leaves. +The chickens, which she had seen and could recognize, were the +element of the familiar she required in order to find any significance +in the picture. + +This tendency, of which the demand for chickens is a rudimentary +manifestation, is the basis of all appreciation. The artist's revelation +of the import of life we can receive and understand only as we have +felt a little of that import for ourselves. Color is meaningless to a +blind man, music does not exist for the deaf. To him who has never +opened his eyes to behold the beauty of field and hill and trees and +sky, to him whose spirit has not dimly apprehended something of +that eternal significance of which these things are the material +visible bodying forth, to such a the work of the master is only so +much paint and canvas. The task of the appreciator, then, is to +develop his capacity to receive and enjoy. + +That capacity is to be trained by the exercise of itself. Each new +harmony which he is enabled to perceive intensifies his power to +feel and widens the range of his vision. The more beauty he +apprehends in the world, so much the more of universal forces he +brings into unity with his own personality. By this extension of his +spirit he reaches out and becomes merged in the all-embracing life. + +If the conception be true that a supreme unity, linking all seemingly +chaotic details, ultimately brings them into order, and that this unity, +which is spiritual, penetrates every atom of matter, fusing everything +and making all things one; then the appreciator will realize that the +significance of art is for the spirit The beauty which the artist reveals +is but the harmony which underlies the universal order; and he in his +turn must apprehend that beauty spiritually. + +From this truth it follows that the condition of aesthetic enjoyment, +or in other words the appreciation of beauty, is detachment of spirit +and remoteness from practical consequences. The classic illustration +of the truth is the saying of Lucretius, that it is sublime to stand on +the shore and behold a shipwreck. It is sublime only as one's +personal interests and feelings are not engaged. It would not be +sublime if it were possible for the spectator to aid in averting the +catastrophe; it would not be sublime if one's friends were aboard the +ship. One is able to appreciate beauty only as one is able to detach +one's self from what is immediate and practical, and by virtue of this +detachment, to apprehend the spiritual significance. The sublimity of +the shipwreck lies in what it expresses of the impersonal might of +elemental forces and man's impotence in the struggle against nature. +That sublimity, which is one manifestation of beauty, is of the spirit, +and by the spirit it must be apprehended. + +To illustrate this truth by a few homely examples. A farmer looking +out on his fields of tossing wheat, drenched in golden sunlight, +exclaims, "Look, isn't that beautiful!" What he really means is: "See +there the promise of a rich harvest, and it is mine." If the fields +belonged to his neighbor, his feelings towards them would be quite +different. No, their _beauty_ is to be seen and felt only by him +whose mind is free of thoughts of personal enrichment and who thus +can perceive the harmony with life of golden sunshine and nature's +abundant gifts. The farmer could not see beyond the material and its +value to him as material. But beauty lies deeper than that, for it is +the expression of spiritual relations. + +Two men are riding together in a railway carriage. As the train +draws into a city, they pass a little group of tumble-down houses, +brown and gray, a heap of corners thrown together. One man thinks: +"What dreary lives these people must lead who dwell there." The +other, with no such stirring of the sympathy, sees a wonderful +"scheme" in grays and browns, or an expressive composition or +ordering of line. Neither could think the thoughts of the other at the +same time with his own. One feels a practical and physical reaction, +and he cannot therefore at that moment penetrate to the meaning of +these things for the spirit; and that meaning is the harmony which +they express. + +From the tangle of daily living with its conflict of interests and its +burden of practical needs, the appreciator turns to art with its power +to chasten and to tranquillize. In art, he finds the revelation in fuller +measure of a beauty which he has felt but vaguely. He realizes that +underlying the external chaos of immediate practical experience +rests a supreme and satisfying order. Of that order he can here and +now perceive but little, hemmed in as he is by the material world, +whose meaning he discerns as through a glass, darkly. Yet he keeps +resolutely on his way, secure in his kinship with the eternal spirit, +and rewarded by momentary glimpses of the "broken arcs" which he +knows will in the end take their appointed places in the "perfect +round." + + + +V + +THE ARTIST + +Out of chaos, order. Man's life on the earth is finite and fragmentary, +but it is the constant effort of his spirit to bring the scattering details +of momentary experience into an enduring harmony with his +personality and with that supreme unity of which he is a part. + +The man who out of the complex disarray of his little world effects a +new harmony is an artist. He who fashioned the first cup, shaping it +according to his ideal,--for no prototype existed,--and in response to +his needs; he who, taking this elementary form, wrought upon it +with his fingers and embellished it according to his ideal and in +response to his need of expressing himself; he, again, who out of the +same need for expression adds to the cup anything new: each of +these workmen is an artist. The reproduction of already existing +forms, with no modification by the individual workman, is not art. +So, for example, only that painter is an artist who adds to his +representation of the visible world some new attribute or quality +born of his own spirit Primitive artisan, craftsman, painter, each +creates in that he reveals and makes actual some part, which before +was but potential, of the all-embracing life. + +As the artist, then, wins new reaches of experience and brings them +into unity, he reveals new beauty, new to men yet world-old. For the +harmony which he effects is new only in the sense that it was not +before perceived. As, in the physical universe, not an atom of matter +through the ages is created or destroyed, so the supreme spiritual life +is constant in its sum and complete. Of this life individuals partake +in varying measure; their growth is determined by how much of it +they make their own. The growth of the soul in this sense is not +different from man's experience of the physical world. The child is +born: he grows up into his family; the circle widens to include +neighbors and the community; the circle widens again as the boy +goes away to school and then to college. With ever-widening sweep +the outermost bound recedes, though still embracing him, as he +reaches out to Europe and at length compasses the earth, conquering +experience and bringing its treasures into tribute to his own spirit. +The things were there; but for the boy each was in turn created as he +made it his own. So the artist, revealing new aspects of the supreme +unity, creates in the sense that he makes possible for his fellows a +fuller taking-up of this life into themselves. + +It may be said that he is the greatest artist who has felt the most of +harmony in life,--the greatest artist but potentially. The beauty he +has perceived must in accordance with our human needs find +expression concretely, because it is only as he manifests himself in +forms which we can understand that we are able to recognize him. +Though a mute, inglorious Milton were Milton still, yet our human +limitations demand his utterance that we may know him. So the +artist accomplishes his mission when he communicates himself. The +human spirit is able to bring the supreme life into unity with itself +according to the measure of its own growth made possible through +expression. + +The supreme life, of which every created thing partakes,--the stone, +the flower, the animal, and man,--is beauty, because it is the +supreme harmony wherein everything has its place in relation to +every other thing. This central unity has its existence in expression. +The round earth, broken off from the stellar system and whirling +along its little orbit through space, is yet ever in communication +with the great system; the tree, with its roots in the earth, puts forth +branches, the branches expand into twigs, the twigs burst into leaves +whose veins reach out into the air; out of the twigs spring buds +swelling into blossoms, the blossoms ripen into fruit, the fruit drops +seed into the earth which gave it and springs up into new trees. The +tree by its growth, which is the putting forth of itself or expression, +develops needs, these needs are satisfied, and the satisfying of the +needs is the condition of its continued expansion. + +Man, too, has his existence in expression. By growth through +expression, which is the creation of a new need, he is enabled to take +up more into himself; he brings more into the unity of his +personality, and thus he expands into the universal harmony. + +The unity which underlies the cosmos--to define once more the +conception which is the basis of the preceding chapters--is of the +spirit. The material world which we see and touch is but the symbol +and bodying forth of spiritual relations. The tranquillizing, satisfying +power of art is due to the revelation which art accomplishes of a +spiritual harmony which transcends the seeming chaos of instant +experience. So it comes about that harmony, or beauty, which is of +the spirit, is apprehended by the spirit. That faculty in the artist by +which he is able to perceive beauty is called _temperament._ By +temperament is to be understood the receptive faculty, the power to +feel, the capacity for sensations, emotions, and "such intellectual +apprehensions as, in strength and directness and their immediately +realized values at the bar of an actual experience, are most like +sensations." The function of temperament is to receive and to +transmit, to interpret, to create in the sense that it reveals. In the +result it is felt to be present only as the medium through which the +forces behind it come to expression. + +Art, the human spirit, temperament,--these terms are general and +abstract. Now the abstract to be realized must be made concrete. Just +as art, in order to be manifest, must be embodied in the particular +work, as the statue, the picture, the building, the drama, the +symphony, so the human spirit becomes operative in the person of +the individual, and temperament may be best studied in the character +of the individual artist. + +As temperament is the receptive faculty, the artist's attitude toward +life is what Wordsworth called "wise passiveness,"--Wordsworth, +the poet of "impassioned contemplation." Keats, too,--and among +the poets, whose vision of beauty was more beautiful, whose grasp +on the truth more true?--characterizes himself as "addicted to +passiveness." It is of temperament that Keats is writing when he says +in a letter: "That quality which goes to form a man of achievement, +especially in literature, and which Shakespeare possessed so +enormously, is _Negative Capability_ ." In another letter he writes:-- + +"It has been an old comparison for our urging on--the Beehive; +however, it seems to me that we should rather be the flower than the +Bee--for it is a false notion that more is gained by receiving than +giving--no, the receiver and the giver are equal in their benefits. The +flower, I doubt not, receives a fair guerdon from the Bee--its leaves +blush deeper in the next spring--and who shall say between Man and +Woman which is the most delighted? Now it is more noble to sit like +Jove than to fly like Mercury--let us not therefore go hurrying about +and collecting honey, bee-like buzzing here and there impatiently +from a knowledge of what is to be aimed at; but let us open our +leaves like a flower and be passive and receptive--budding patiently +under the eye of Apollo and taking hints from every noble insect +that favours us with a visit--sap will be given us for meat and dew +for drink. . . . + + "O fret not after knowledge--I have none, + And yet my song comes native with the warmth. + O fret not after knowledge--I have none, + And yet the Evening listens. He who saddens + At thought of idleness cannot be idle, + And he's awake who thinks himself asleep." + +Still again he says: "The Genius of Poetry must work out its own +salvation in a man: It cannot be matured by law and precept, but by +sensation and watchfulness in itself. That which is creative must +create itself." + +A nature so constituted, a nature receptive and passive, is +necessarily withdrawn from practical affairs. To revert to Keats as +an example, for Keats is so wholly the artist, it is his remoteness +from the daily life about him that makes him the man of no one +country or time. His poetry has a kind of universality, but +universality within a definite sphere, and that sphere is the world of +things lovely and fair. In a playful mood Keats writes to his sister: +"Give me Books, fruit, French wine and fine weather and a little +music out of doors, played by somebody I do not know . . . and I can +pass a summer very quietly without caring much about Fat Louis, fat +Regent or the Duke of Wellington." These are trivial words; but they +serve to define in some measure the artistic temperament. + +For this characteristic remoteness from affairs the artist is sometimes +reproached by those who pin their faith to material things. Such are +not aware that for the artist the only reality is the life of the spirit. +The artist, as Carlyle says of the Man of Letters, "lives in the inward +sphere of things, in the True, Divine and Eternal, which exists +always, unseen to most, under the Temporary, Trivial: his being is in +that." Temperament constitutes the whole moral nature of the artist. +"With a great poet," says Keats, "the sense of beauty overcomes +every consideration, or rather obliterates all consideration." It is the +standard which measures the worth of any act. It is conscience, too; +for the functions performed by conscience in the normal moral life +of the man of action are fulfilled by the artist's devotion to his ideal; +his service to his art is his sole and sufficient obligation. + +And where the man of action looks to find his rewards in the +approval of his fellow men, the artist cares to please himself. The +very act of expressing is itself the joy and the reward. To this truth +Keats again stands as witness: "I feel assured," he says, "I should +write from the mere yearning and fondness I have for the beautiful, +even if my night's labours should be burnt every Morning and no +eye ever shine upon them." And still again: "I value more the +privilege of seeing great things in loneliness than the fame of a +prophet." Not that the artist does not crave appreciation. His +message fails of completeness if there is no ear to hear it, if it does +not meet a sympathy which understands. But the true artist removes +all shadow of petty vanity and becomes, in Whitman's phrase, "the +free channel of himself." He is but the medium through whom the +spirit of beauty reveals itself; in thankfulness and praise he but +receives and transmits. That it is given him to see beauty and to +interpret it is enough. + +It is by virtue of his power to feel that the artist is able to apprehend +beauty; his temperament is ever responsive to new harmonies. By +force of his imagination, which is one function of his temperament, +he sends his spirit into other lives, absorbs their experience and +makes it his own, and ultimately identifies himself with world forces +and becomes creator. In a lyric passage in a letter Keats exclaims:-- + +"The mighty abstract Idea I have of Beauty in all things stifles the +more divided and minute domestic happiness. . . . I feel more and +more every day, as my imagination strengthens, that I do not live in +this world alone, but in a thousand worlds. No sooner am I alone +than shapes of epic greatness are stationed around me, and serve my +Spirit the office which is equivalent to a King's body-guard--then +'Tragedy with sceptered pall comes sweeping by.' According to my +state of mind I am with Achilles shouting in the Trenches, or with +Theocritus in the Vales of Sicily. Or I throw my whole being into +Troilus, and repeating those lines, 'I wander like a lost soul upon the +Stygian Banks staying for waftage,' I melt into the air with a +voluptuousness so delicate that I am content to be alone." + +This power to penetrate and to identify was exercised with peculiar +directness and plenitude by Walt Whitman, prophet of the +omnipotence of man. To find the burden of his message formulated +in the single phrase one may turn to his Poems quite at random. + + "My spirit has pass'd in compassion and determination around the + whole earth." + "I inhale great draughts of space,-- + The east and the west are mine, and the north and the south are + mine. + . . . . . + All seems beautiful to me." + +Of the artist may be affirmed what Whitman affirms of the +Answerer:-- + + "Every existence has its idiom, every thing has an idiom and + tongue, + He resolves all tongues into his own and bestows it upon men, + and any man translates, and any man translates himself also, + One part does not counteract another part, he is the joiner, he + sees how they join." + +As the artist sends out his spirit through the world, as he becomes +the channel of universal and divine influences, so he is admitted to +new and ever new revelations of beauty. And stirred by the glorious +vision, he brings that beauty to earth, communicating it to his +fellows and making them partakers of it, as he gives his feeling +expression. Thus finding utterance as the prophet of God, he +consummates his mission and takes his place in the world order. +Herein he has his being, for life is expression; and each new +harmony which he makes manifest is the medium of his fuller +identification with the universal life. + +So it is that the artist is the supreme interpreter, the mediator +between man and beauty. His work is a work of joy, of gratitude, of +worship. He is the happy servant of God, His prophet, through +whom He declares Himself to the children of men. + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Enjoyment of Art, by Carleton Noyes + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ENJOYMENT OF ART *** + +***** This file should be named 27194-8.txt or 27194-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/7/1/9/27194/ + +Produced by Ruth Hart + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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