The Florentine Painters of the Renaissance | Page 3

never painted a figure which has artistic existence. Their works have
value, if at all, as highly elaborate, very intelligible symbols, capable,
indeed, of communicating something, but losing all higher value the
moment the message is delivered.
Giotto's paintings, on the contrary, have not only as much power of
appealing to the tactile imagination as is possessed by the objects
represented--human figures in particular--but actually more, with the
necessary result that to his contemporaries they conveyed a keener
sense of reality, of life-likeness than the objects themselves! We whose
current knowledge of anatomy is greater, who expect more articulation
and suppleness in the human figure, who, in short, see much less
naïvely now than Giotto's contemporaries, no longer find his paintings
more than life-like; but we still feel them to be intensely real in the
sense that they still powerfully appeal to our tactile imagination,
thereby compelling us, as do all things that stimulate our sense of touch
while they present themselves to our eyes, to take their existence for
granted. And it is only when we can take for granted the existence of
the object painted that it can begin to give us pleasure that is genuinely
artistic, as separated from the interest we feel in symbols.
[Page heading: ANALYSIS OF ENJOYMENT OF PAINTING]
At the risk of seeming to wander off into the boundless domain of
æsthetics, we must stop at this point for a moment to make sure that we
are of one mind regarding the meaning of the phrase "artistic pleasure,"
in so far at least as it is used in connection with painting.
What is the point at which ordinary pleasures pass over into the specific
pleasures derived from each one of the arts? Our judgment about the
merits of any given work of art depends to a large extent upon our
answer to this question. Those who have not yet differentiated the
specific pleasures of the art of painting from the pleasures they derive

from the art of literature, will be likely to fall into the error of judging
the picture by its dramatic presentation of a situation or its rendering of
character; will, in short, demand of the painting that it shall be in the
first place a good illustration. Those others who seek in painting what
is usually sought in music, the communication of a pleasurable state of
emotion, will prefer pictures which suggest pleasant associations, nice
people, refined amusements, agreeable landscapes. In many cases this
lack of clearness is of comparatively slight importance, the given
picture containing all these pleasure-giving elements in addition to the
qualities peculiar to the art of painting. But in the case of the
Florentines, the distinction is of vital consequence, for they have been
the artists in Europe who have most resolutely set themselves to work
upon the specific problems of the art of figure-painting, and have
neglected, more than any other school, to call to their aid the secondary
pleasures of association. With them the issue is clear. If we wish to
appreciate their merit, we are forced to disregard the desire for pretty or
agreeable types, dramatically interpreted situations, and, in fact,
"suggestiveness" of any kind. Worse still, we must even forego our
pleasure in colour, often a genuinely artistic pleasure, for they never
systematically exploited this element, and in some of their best works
the colour is actually harsh and unpleasant. It was in fact upon form,
and form alone, that the great Florentine masters concentrated their
efforts, and we are consequently forced to the belief that, in their
pictures at least, form is the principal source of our æsthetic enjoyment.
Now in what way, we ask, can form in painting give me a sensation of
pleasure which differs from the ordinary sensations I receive from form?
How is it that an object whose recognition in nature may have given me
no pleasure, becomes, when recognised in a picture, a source of
æsthetic enjoyment, or that recognition pleasurable in nature becomes
an enhanced pleasure the moment it is transferred to art? The answer, I
believe, depends upon the fact that art stimulates to an unwonted
activity psychical processes which are in themselves the source of most
(if not all) of our pleasures, and which here, free from disturbing
physical sensations, never tend to pass over into pain. For instance: I
am in the habit of realising a given object with an intensity that we
shall value as 2. If I suddenly realise this familiar object with an

intensity of 4, I receive the immediate pleasure which accompanies a
doubling of my mental activity. But the pleasure rarely stops here.
Those who are capable of receiving direct pleasure from a work of art,
are generally led on to the further pleasures of self-consciousness. The
fact that