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.