EFFECT, ACCIDENT, RELIEF, AND KEEPING.
In Effect, the means are widely different indeed which lead to the same result! Rembrandt, with his concentrated light and wide diffusion of shade—Rubens, and his school, with his splendid extension of light and of colour—Vandyke, with the Dutch and Flemish painters—Titian—all arrive at the same end, although by the most opposite means. Some aim at a particular effect; others at a general one, proceeding from different combinations, and different views and ideas. All effects should be consistent with the subject treated. The effect will be more or less bad as the parts which are to constitute it are more or less scattered or diffused. Masses of light, supported and brought out by masses of shadow, are the surest means of producing it. Effect is procured by the strongest opposition, and sometimes by the reverse. Arrangement and Expression is, in historical composition, much the same thing that Effect is in landscape-painting. On the other hand, particular effects mostly arise from circumstance. Sudden and startling effects are not unfrequently produced by a piece of charcoal on brown or grey paper; beautiful ones by the simple operation of the black lead pencil or stump, until we trace it up to the whole range of the palette, in the most splendid and magnificent efforts of colour.
Every part of a picture should occasion pleasure in detail! If we are fascinated with the colour of the highest or prevailing light, the most anxious care should be exercised that its influence does not destroy our admiration of the others: to avoid this prejudice, the principal light, or colour of it, should not be so influential as to prevent the eye being gently led away from it, by the repetition of a softer grade of its own, to others of a less imposing quality: that must of necessity be there, to give value to, and influence the importance of the principal.
Effect consists in either lights and shadows, or colours, so massed and blended in their arrangement, as to produce breadth.
The greatest power of Effect is often produced from the most simple materials. All the force of the palette, and all the strength of the master, is not unfrequently called into action by no other materials than a straight horizon meeting the sky, supported by an undulating line or two; and exemplifying the most scientific manœuvres in the management of breadth, and in diversity of colour, on which the eye loves to dwell, and repose from the fatigue occasioned by a repetition of forms.
A dark object, placed against the most retiring or lightest part of the picture, while it acquires all the startling effect to be derived from great force, and is a resource so much adopted by the greatest landscape-painters, often, in my opinion, destroys the whole keeping of the work. Bringing such strong objects up against the sun, was the great vice of Claude; Cuyp and Both managed it better, but certainly not always with success.
Keeping is a term in art which implies that every object and colour should be in its place;—the object, its exact space to stand on, and the colours in strict harmony and accordance; each possessing the exact strength which belongs to its situation in the picture.
Relief, and occasionally Chiaro-Scuro, which, by its arrangement of light and shade, describes the necessary forms that are to be revealed: this may likewise be effected by light and dark colours alone, or by opposition of colours and sharp contrasts.
The highest point or mass of the light, from which the gradations radiate, should be kept very pure, allowing as little of the shade tint to insinuate itself as possible.
If the lights of a picture are few, it will mainly contribute to its breadth and repose:—if many, or scattered, the result will be confusion. I say, to keep the leading mass of light pure and clean, should employ our deepest attention.
When the attention is to be fixed to a particular object, the degree of power given to the accessories will alone establish its degree of consequence: but it must not be wholly insulated; those accessories, being the medium of its own importance, must contribute all to assist it to its place, without weakening its force or imparing its character; as the middle tints find their value and clearness only by the strength of the lights, and the depths of the darks.
Pictures, painted in a 'light key,' possess many advantages:—
Great breadth of Effect is produced by placing the principal mass of shadow on, or rather immediately under, the horizon; graduating upwards into the clouds, and downwards, in a long angle, to a broad light on the base line; on which a figure or any other object, however small, but darker than the rest, being placed, will produce an effect that has become extremely popular of late. This is equally applicable to landscape or sea pieces; and was a favourite arrangement of A. Vandervelde. When the picture is mostly made up of half tint, his manner was to throw all the power of the palette into his figures; bringing them out strong, dark, and cutting on the foreground; and, in the retiring groups, diminishing the force as little as possible; keeping the shadows flat, and a little weaker in colour. This management produces one of the most powerful daylight effects, though not so ærial; but the sacrifice of the last is as nothing to the want of the former. Atmospheric effect is scarcely missed when the whole is on so light a key, as the quantity of half tint employed renders it.
Most of the Dutch landscape painters seem universally agreed on this arrangement, as having that beautiful contrast of force and softness we so often see in coast scenes, and leaving so large a space as two-thirds of the picture for the luminous forms of the clouds.
Broken heaths, road scenes, corn-fields, boats on the water, with their forcible and deep shadows, fishermen on the sands, all readily adapt themselves to this manner; which, likewise, from the light tone that pervades the whole, requires the strongest opposition and contrast of colour—so that the colours be carried well through the picture; that is, if the ground be warm, a figure in blue placed in the foreground may be carried out by being repeated in the blue of the water, and so into parts of the sky, &c. And, on the other hand, if the ground be cool grey, as in a river scene, the boats may be yellow, and the figures red, carried up and diffused into the warm lights of the sky, or striking on the sandy shore and distant buildings, and even reaching the birds in the air—all will help to convey the colours through the work.
In working out this system, let the lights be bright, and their shadows strong and forcible, keeping the middle tints tender, airy, and delicate. A few trials on this plan will soon convince the student of the beauty and real look of daylight it has over many others.
In examining the works of Cuyp, when the picture is painted on a light key, he is sure to make use of very strong colour, to clear up and give vigour to the whole, in his figures; serving, at the same time, to invest the general mass with air, breadth, and extent.
Rembrandt thought it of more consequence to paint light, than the objects seen by it.
'Titian's great care was to express the general colour, to preserve the masses of light and shade, and to give, by opposition, the idea of that solidity which is inseparable from natural objects. When these are preserved, though the work should possess no other merit, it will have, in a proper place, its complete effect; but where any of these are wanting, however minutely laboured the picture may be in detail, the whole will have a false, and even an unfinished appearance, at whatever distance, or in whatever light it can be shown. It is in vain to attend to the variations of tints, if in that attention, the general hue is lost, or to finish ever so minutely the parts, if the masses are not observed, or the whole not well put together. And those who will examine into the artifice, will find it to consist in the power of generalizing, and the shortness and simplicity of the means employed;' and in fixed principles, our general ideas predominating over our individual.
Rubens, in his splendid manner, involved all the schools—Roman, Dutch, and Venetian! yet, with all this magnificence and variety, possessed repose.
Accident.—Accident often comes in aid of invention. In nature, all objects by daylight are equally illumined; the painter has, therefore, always found it necessary to avail himself of accident, whenever it may occur: shadows, in particular, reflected upon one object by another; large floating masses of light or shade thrown across a mountain, a flat country, or an open sea, by the passing clouds as they sail by; flashes and streaks of light, as they struggle from between them, &c., are all adapted to work out the general effect. Where the forms of a composition are insufficient, this is the usual resource, these accessories generally supplying grandeur and elevation to the scene. All catching lights should be laid hold of with equal tenacity. The clearing off of a shower is particularly favourable to this useful auxiliary.