The Mind of the Artist | Page 5

art,
either as the subjects, the objects, or the materials of imitation: every
fine art, therefore, has certain physical sciences collateral to it, on the
abstractions of which it builds, more or less, according to its nature and
purpose. But the drift of the art itself is something totally distinct from
that of the physical science to which it is related; and it is not more
absurd to say that physiology or anatomy constitute the science of
poetry or dramatic art than that acoustics and harmonics are the science
of music; optics, of painting; mechanics, or other branches of physical
science, that of architecture.
Dyce.
XXV
After all I have seen of Art, with nothing am I more impressed than
with the necessity, in all great work, for suppressing the workman and
all the mean dexterity of practice. The result itself, in quiet dignity, is
the only worthy attainment. Wood-engraving, of all things most ready
for dexterity, reads us a good lesson.
Edward Calvert.
XXVI

Shall Painting be confined to the sordid drudgery of facsimile
representations of merely mortal and perishing substances, and not be
as poetry and music are, elevated into its own proper sphere of
invention and visionary conception? No, it shall not be so! Painting, as
well as poetry and music, exists and exults in immortal thoughts.
Blake.
XXVII
If any man has any poetry in him, he should paint, for it has all been
said and written, and they have scarcely begun to paint it.
William Morris.
XXVIII
Long live conscience and simplicity! there lies the only way to the true
and the sublime.
Corot.
XXIX
All the young men of this school of Ingres have something of the
pedant about them; they seem to think that merely to be enrolled among
the party of serious painters is a merit in itself. Serious painting is their
party cry. I told Demay that a crowd of people of talent had done
nothing worth speaking of because of all these factious dogmas that
they get enslaved to, or that the prejudice of the moment imposes on
them. So, for example, with this famous cry of Beauty, which is,
according to the world's opinion, the goal of the arts: if it is the one and
only goal, what becomes of men who, like Rubens, Rembrandt, and
northern natures in general, prefer other qualities? Demand of Puget
purity, beauty in fact, and it is good-bye to his verve. Speaking
generally, men of the North are less attracted to beauty; the Italian
prefers decoration; this applies to music too.

Delacroix.
XXX
At the present time the task is easier. It is a question of allowing to
everything its own interest, of putting man back in his place, and, if
need be, of doing without him. The moment has come to think less, to
aim less high, to look more closely, to observe better, to paint as well
but differently. This is the painting of the crowd, of the townsman, the
workman, the parvenu, the man in the street; done wholly for him, done
from him. It is a question of becoming humble before humble things,
small before small things, subtle before subtle things; of gathering them
all together without omission and without disdain, of entering
familiarly into their intimacy, affectionately into their way of being; it
is a matter of sympathy, attentive curiosity, patience. Henceforth,
genius will consist in having no prejudice, in not being conscious of
one's knowledge, in allowing oneself to be taken by surprise by one's
model, in asking only from him how he shall be represented. As for
beautifying--never! ennobling--never! correcting--never! These are lies
and useless trouble. Is there not in every artist worthy of the name a
something which sees to this naturally and without effort?
Fromentin.
XXXI
I send you also some etchings and a "Woman drinking Absinthe,"
drawn this winter from life in Paris. It is a girl called Marie Joliet, who
used every evening to come drunk to the Bal Bullier, and who had a
look in her eyes of death galvanised into life. I made her sit to me and
tried to render what I saw. This is my principle in the task I have set
before me. I am determined to make no book-illustration but it shall be
a means of contributing towards an effect of life and nothing more. A
patch of colour and it is sufficient; we must leave these childish
thoughts behind us. Life! we must try to render life, and it is hard
enough.
Felicien Rops.

XXXII
So this damned Realism made an instinctive appeal to my painter's
vanity, and deriding all traditions, cried aloud with the confidence of
ignorance, "Back to Nature!" Nature! ah, my friend, what mischief that
cry has done me. Where was there an apostle apter