Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 7, No. 40, February, 1861 | Page 3

works of Titian.
But the laws which Titian discovered have been unheeded for centuries;
and they might have remained so, had not the mind of William Page
felt the necessity of their revival and use. To him there could be no
chance-work. Art must have laws as definite and immutable as those of
science; indeed, the body in which the spirit of art is developed, and
through which it acts, must be science itself. He saw, that, if exact
imitation of Nature be taken as the law in painting, there must
inevitably occur the difficulty to which we have before referred,--that,
above a certain point, paint no longer undergoes transfiguration,
thereby losing its character as mere coloring material,--that, if the
ordinary tone of Nature be held as the legitimate key-note, the scope of
the palette would be exhausted before success could be achieved.
Any one of Turner's latest pictures may serve to illustrate the nature of
this difficulty. Although in his early practice he was remarkable for his
judicious restraint, it is evident that the splendors of the higher
phenomena of light had for him unlimited fascination; and he may be
traced advancing cautiously through that period of his career which was
marked by the influence of Claude, toward what he hoped would prove,
and perhaps believed to be, a realization of such splendors.

It must have been observed by those who have studied his later pictures,
that, while the low passages of the composition are wonderfully fine
and representative, all the higher parts, those supposed or intended to
stand for the radiance of dazzling light, fail utterly in representative
capacity. There is an abundance of the most brilliant pigment, but it is
still paint,--unmitigated ochre and white lead. The spectator is obliged
to recede from the picture until distance enables the eye to transmute
the offending material and reconcile the conflicting passages.
To accomplish the result of rendering the quality and effect of high
light was one of the problems to which Mr. Page years ago turned his
attention; and he found its solution in the transposition of the scale. The
pitch of Nature could not be adopted as the immutable in art. That were
impossible, unless art presumed to cope with Nature.
More than he, no man could respect the properties and qualities of the
visible world. His ideas of the truthful rendering of that which became
the subject of his pencil might seem preposterous to those who knew
not the wonderful significancy which he attached to individual forms
and tints. Yet, in imitation, where is the limit? What is possible? Must
there be any sacrifice?
Evidently there must be; and of course it follows that the less important
must be sacrificed. Nature herself has taught the artist that the most
variable of all her phenomena is that of tone. Other truths of Nature
have a character of permanency which the artist cannot modify without
violating the first principles of art. He is required to render the essential;
and to render the essential of that which art cannot sacrifice, if it would,
and continue art, he foregoes the non-essential and evanescent.
Not only is this permitted,--it is demanded. It is a law through which
alone success is attainable. In obedience to it, Mr. Page adopts a key
somewhat lower than that of Nature as a point of departure, using his
degrees of color frugally, especially in the ascending scale. With this
economy, when he approaches the luminous effects of Nature, he finds,
just where any other palette would be exhausted, upon his own a
reserve of high color. With this, seeking only a corresponding effect of
light in that lower tone which assumes no rivalry with the infinite glory
of Nature, he attains to a representation fully successful.
We would not have it understood that a mere transposition of the scale
is all that is required to accomplish such a result; only this,--that in no

other way can such a result be secured. To color well, to color so that
forms upon the canvas give back tints like those of the objects which
have served as models, is only half the work. Quality, as well as color,
must be attained. Local, reflected, and transmitted color can be imitated;
but as in the attempt to represent light its luminousness is the element
which defeats the artist, so, throughout Nature, quality, texture, are the
elements which most severely test his power.
Could any indispensable truth be considered secondary, it might be
assumed that rendering truthfully the qualities of Nature is the first and
highest of art. The forms and colors of objects vary infinitely. It might
be said that the law of all existence is, in these two particulars, that of
change. From the time a human being is born until it