ON THE IMITATION OF NATURE
| The Champion.] | [December 25, 1814. |
The imitation of nature is the great object of art. Of course, the principles by which this imitation should be regulated, form the leading topic of Sir Joshua Reynolds’s lectures. It is certain that the mechanical imitation of individual objects, or the parts of individual objects, does not always produce beauty or grandeur; or, generally speaking that the whole of art does not consist in copying nature. Reynolds seems hence disposed to infer, that the whole of art consists in not imitating individual nature. This is also an error, and an error on the worst side.
Sir Joshua’s general system may be summed up in two words,—‘That the great style in painting consists in avoiding the details, and peculiarities of particular objects.’ This sweeping principle he applies almost indiscriminately to portrait, history, and landscape;—and he appears to have been led to the conclusion itself, from supposing the imitation of particulars to be inconsistent with general truth and effect.
It will not be unimportant to inquire how far this opinion is well-founded: for it appears to us, that the highest perfection of the art depends, not on the separation, but on the union (as far as possible) of general truth and effect with individual distinctness and accuracy.
First, it is said that the great style in painting, as it relates to the immediate imitation of external nature, consists in avoiding the details of particular objects.
It consists neither in giving nor avoiding them, but in something quite different from both. Any one may avoid the details. So far, there is no difference between the Cartoons, and a common sign-painting. Greatness consists in giving the larger masses and proportions with truth;—this does not prevent giving the smaller ones too. The utmost grandeur of outline, and the broadest masses of light and shade, are perfectly compatible with the greatest minuteness and delicacy of detail, as may be seen in nature. It is not, indeed, common to see both qualities combined in the imitations of nature, any more than the combination of other excellences; nor are we here saying to which the principal attention of the artist should be directed; but we deny, that, considered in themselves, the absence of the one quality is necessary or sufficient to the production of the other.
If, for example, the form of the eyebrow is correctly given, it will be perfectly indifferent to the truth or grandeur of the design, whether it consist of one broad mark, or is composed of a number of hair-lines, arranged in the same order. So, if the lights and shades are disposed in fine and large masses, the breadth of the picture, as it is called, cannot possibly be affected by the filling up of those masses with the details;—that is, with the subordinate distinctions which appear in nature. The anatomical details in Michael Angelo, the ever-varying outline of Raphael, the perfect execution of the Greek statues, do not assuredly destroy their symmetry or dignity of form;—and in the finest specimens of the composition of colour, we may observe the largest masses combined with the greatest variety in the parts, of which those masses are composed.
The gross style consists in giving no details,—the finical in giving nothing else. Nature contains both large and small parts,—both masses and details; and the same may be said of the most perfect works of art. The union of both kinds of excellence, of strength with delicacy, as far as the limits of human capacity and the shortness of human life would permit, is that which has established the reputation of the greatest masters. Farther,—their most finished works are their best. The predominance, however, of either excellence in these masters, has, of course, varied according to their opinion of the relative value of these different qualities,—the labour they had the time or patience to bestow on their works,—the skill of the artist, or the nature and extent of his subject. But, if the rule here objected to,—that the careful imitation of the parts injures the effect of the whole,—be at once admitted, slovenliness would become another name for genius, and the most unfinished performance would necessarily be the best. That such has been the confused impression left on the mind by the perusal of Sir Joshua’s discourses, is evident from the practice as well as the conversation of many (even eminent) artists. The late Mr. Opie proceeded entirely on this principle. He left many admirable studies of portraits, particularly in what relates to the disposition and effect of light and shade. But he never finished any of the parts, thinking them beneath the attention of a great man. He went over the whole head the second day as he had done the day before, and therefore made no progress. The picture at last, having neither the lightness of a sketch, nor the accuracy of a finished work, looked coarse, laboured, and heavy.
‘Would you then have an artist finish like Denner?’ is the triumphant appeal which is made as decisive against all objections. To which, as it is an appeal to authority, the proper answer seems to be,—‘No; but we would have him finish like Titian or Correggio.’ Denner is an example of finishing not to be followed, but shunned, because he did nothing but finish; because he finished ill, and because he finished to excess;—for in all things there is a certain proportion of means to ends. He pored into the littlenesses of objects, till he lost sight of nature, instead of imitating it. He represents the human face, perhaps, as it might appear through a magnifying glass, but certainly not as it ever appears to us. It is the business of painting to express objects as they appear naturally, not as they may be made to appear artificially. His flesh is as blooming and glossy as a flower or a shell. Titian’s finishing, on the contrary, is equally admirable, because it is engrafted on the most profound knowledge of effect, and attention to the character of what he represents. His pictures have the exact look of nature, the very tone and texture of flesh. The endless variety of his tints is blended into the greatest simplicity. There is a proper degree both of solidity and transparency. All the parts hang together: every stroke tells, and adds to the effect of the rest.
To understand the value of any excellence, we must refer to the use which has been made of it, not to instances of its abuse. If there is a certain degree of ineffectual microscopic finishing, which we never find united with an attention to other higher and more indispensable parts of the art, we may suspect that there is something incompatible between them, and that the pursuit of the one diverts the mind from the attainment of the other. But this is the real point to stop at—where alone we should limit our theory or our efforts. Wherever different excellences have been actually united to a certain point of perfection, to that point (abstractedly speaking) we are sure that they may, and ought to be united again. There is no occasion to add the incitements of indolence, affectation, and false theory, to the other causes which contribute to the decline of art!
Sir Joshua seems, indeed, to deny that Titian finished much, and says that he produced, by two or three strokes of his pencil, effects which the most laborious copyists would in vain attempt to equal. It is true that he availed himself, in a considerable degree, of what is called execution, to facilitate his imitation of nature, but it was to facilitate, not to supersede it. By the methods of scumbling or glazing, he often broke the masses of his flesh,—or by laying on lumps of colour produced particular effects, to a degree that he could not otherwise have reached without considerable loss of time. We do not object to execution: it saves labour, and shews a mastery both of hand and eye. But then there is nothing more distinct than execution and daubing. Indeed, it is evident, that the only use of execution is to give the details more compendiously, and sometimes, even more happily. Leave out all regard to the details, reduce the whole into crude unvarying masses, and it becomes totally useless; for these can be given just as well without execution as with it. Titian, however, made a very moderate, though a very admirable use of this power; and those who copy his pictures will find, that the simplicity is in the results, not in the details.
The other Venetian painters made too violent a use of execution, unless their subjects formed an excuse for them. Vandyke successfully employed it in giving the last finishing to the details. Rembrandt employed it still more, and with more perfect truth of effect.—Rubens employed it equally, but not so as to produce an equal resemblance of nature. His pencil ran away with his eye.—To conclude our observations on this head, we will only add, that while the artist thinks that there is any thing to be done, either to the whole or to the parts of his picture, which can give it still more the look of nature, if he is willing to proceed, we would not advise him to desist.—This rule is still more necessary to the young student, for he will relax in his attention as he grows older. And again, with respect to the subordinate parts of a picture, there is no danger that he will bestow a disproportionate degree of labour upon them, because he will not feel the same interest in copying them, and because a much less degree of accuracy will serve every purpose of deception;—the nicety of our habitual observations being always in proportion to our interest in the objects.—Sir Joshua somewhere objects to the attempt to deceive by painting; and his reason is, that wax-work, which deceives most effectually, is a very disagreeable as well as contemptible art. It might be answered, first, that nothing is much more unlike nature than such figures generally are, and farther, that they only produce the appearance of prominence and relief, by having it in reality,—in which they are just the reverse of painting.
Secondly, with regard to EXPRESSION, we can hardly agree with Sir Joshua that ‘the perfection of imitation consists in giving the general idea or character, not the peculiarities of individuals.’—We do not think this rule at all well-founded with respect to portrait-painting, nor applicable to history to the extent to which Sir Joshua carries it. For the present, we shall confine ourselves to the former of these.
No doubt, if we were to chuse between the general character and the peculiarities of feature, we ought to prefer the former. But they are so far from being incompatible with, that they are not without some difficulty distinguishable from, each other. There is indeed a general look of the face, a predominant expression arising from the correspondence and connection of the different parts, which it is always of the first and last importance to give; and without which no elaboration of detached parts, or marking of the peculiarity of single features, is worth any thing; but which at the same time, is certainly not destroyed, but assisted, by the careful finishing, and still more by giving the exact outline of each part.
It is on this point that the French and English schools differ, and (in my opinion) are both wrong. The English seem generally to suppose, that, if they only leave out the subordinate parts, they are sure of the general result. The French, on the contrary, as idly imagine, that by attending to each separate part, they must infallibly arrive at a correct whole,—not considering that, besides the parts, there is their relation to each other, and the general character stamped upon them by the mind itself, which to be seen must be felt,—for it is demonstrable that all expression and character are perceived by the mind, and not by the eye only. The French painters see only lines, and precise differences;—the English only general masses, and strong effects. Hence the two nations constantly reproach one another with the difference of their styles of art; the one as dry, hard and minute, the other as gross, gothic, and unfinished; and they will probably remain for ever satisfied with each other’s defects, which afford a very tolerable fund of consolation on either side.
There is something in the two styles, which arises, perhaps, from national countenance as well as character:—the French physiognomy is frittered away into a parcel of little moveable compartments and distinct signs of intelligence,—like a telegraphic machinery. The English countenance, on the other hand, is too apt to sink into a lumpish mass, with very few ideas, and those set in a sort of stupid stereotype.
To return to the proper business of portrait-painting. We mean to speak of it, not as a lucrative profession, nor as an indolent amusement, (for we interfere with no man’s profits or pleasures), but as a bona fide art, the object of which is to exercise the talents of the artist, and to add to the stock of ideas in the public. And in this point of view, we should imagine that that is the best portrait which contains the fullest representation of individual nature.
Portrait-painting is the biography of the pencil, and he who gives most of the peculiarities and details, with most of the general character,—that is of keeping,—is the best biographer, and the best portrait-painter. What if Boswell (the prince of biographers) had not given us the scene between Wilkes and Johnson at Dilly’s table, or had not introduced the little episode of Goldsmith strutting about in his peach-coloured coat after the success of his play,—should we have had a more perfect idea of the general character of those celebrated persons from the omission of these particulars? Or if Reynolds had not painted the former as ‘blinking Sam,’ or had given us such a representation of the latter as we see of some modern poets in some modern magazines, the fame of that painter would have been confined to the circles of fashion,—where they naturally look for the same selection of beauties in a portrait, as of topics in a dedication, or a copy of complimentary verses!
It has not been uncommon that portraits of this kind, which professed to admit all the peculiarities, and to heighten all the excellences of a face, have been elevated by ignorance and affectation, to the dignified rank of historical portrait. But in fact they are merely caricature transposed: that is, as the caricaturist makes a mouth wider than it really is, so the painter of flattering likenesses (as they are termed) makes it not so wide, by a process just as mechanical, and more insipid. Instead, however, of objecting captiously to common theory or practice, it will perhaps be better to state at once our own conceptions of historical portrait. It consists, then, in seizing the predominant form or expression, and preserving it with truth throughout every part. It is representing the individual under one consistent, probable, and striking view; or shewing the different features, muscles, etc. in one action, and modified by one principle. A face thus painted, is historical;—that is, it carries its own internal evidence of truth and nature with it; and the number of individual peculiarities, as long as they are true to nature, cannot lessen, but must add to the general strength of the impression.
To give an example or two of what we mean. We conceive that the common portrait of Oliver Cromwell would be less valuable and striking if the wart on the face were taken away. It corresponds with the general roughness and knottiness of the rest of the face;—or if considered merely as an accident, it operates as a kind of circumstantial evidence of the genuineness of the representation. Sir Joshua Reynolds’s portrait of Dr. Johnson has altogether that sluggishness of outward appearance,—that want of quickness and versatility,—that absorption of faculty, and look of purblind reflection, which were characteristic of his mind. The accidental discomposure of his wig indicates his habits. If, with the same felicity and truth of conception, this portrait (we mean the common one reading) had been more made out, it would not have been less historical, though it would have been more like and natural.
Titian’s portraits are the most historical that ever were painted; and they are so for this reason, that they have most consistency of form and expression. His portraits of Hippolito de Medici, and of a young Neapolitan nobleman in the Louvre, are a striking contrast in this respect. All the lines of the face in the one;—the eyebrows, the nose, the corners of the mouth, the contour of the face,—present the same sharp angles, the same acute, edgy, contracted expression. The other face has the finest expansion of feature and outline, and conveys the most exquisite idea possible of mild, thoughtful sentiment. The harmony of the expression constitutes as great a charm in Titian’s portraits, as that of colour. The similarity sometimes objected to them, is partly national, and partly arises from the class of persons whom he painted. He painted only Italians; and in his time none but persons of the highest rank, senators or cardinals, sat for their pictures.
Sir Joshua appears to have been led into several errors by a false use of the terms general and particular. Nothing can be more different than the various application of both these terms to different things, and yet Sir Joshua constantly uses and reasons upon them as invariable. There are three senses of the expression general character, as applied to ideas or objects. In the first, it signifies the general appearance or aggregate impression of the whole object, as opposed to the mere detail of detached parts. In the second, it signifies the class, or what a number of such objects have in common with one another, to the exclusion of their characteristic differences. In this sense it is tantamount to abstract. In the third it signifies what is usual or common, in opposition to mere singularity, or accidental exceptions to the ordinary course of nature. The general idea or character of a particular face, i.e. the aggregate impression resulting from all the parts combined, is surely very different from the abstract idea, or what it has in common with several others. If on giving the former all character depends; to give nothing but the latter is to take away all character. The more a painter comprehends of what he sees, the more valuable his work will be: but it is not true that his excellence will be the greater, the more he abstracts from what he sees.—There is an essential distinction which Sir Joshua has not observed. The details and peculiarities of nature are only inconsistent with abstract ideas, and not with general or aggregate effects. By confounding the two things, Sir Joshua excludes the peculiarities and details not only from his historical composition, but from an enlarged view and comprehensive imitation of individual nature.
We have here attempted to give some account of what should be meant by the ideal in portrait-painting: in our next and concluding article on this subject, we shall attempt an explanation of this term, as it applies to historical painting.