The fundamental law in biology is that expressed in the well-known aphorism, Omne vivum e vivo (“All life from life”). The belief in abiogenesis or spontaneous generation, as now taking place, has completely disappeared from biological teaching.
In studying savage art we are irresistibly forced to an analogous conclusion. By carefully studying a number of designs we find, providing the series is sufficiently extensive, that a complex, or even an apparently simple pattern, is the result of a long series of variations from a quite dissimilar original. The latter may in very many cases be proved to be a direct copy or representation of a natural or artificial object. From this it is clear that a large number of patterns can be shown to be natural developments from a realistic representation of an actual object, and not to be a mental creation on the part of the artist.
There are certain styles of ornamentation which, at all events in particular cases, may very well be original, taking that word in its ordinary sense, such, for example, as zigzag lines, cross-hatching, and so forth. The mere toying with any implement which could make a mark on any surface might suggest the simplest ornamentation to the most savage mind. This may or may not have been the case, and it is entirely beyond proof either way, and therefore we must not press our analogy too far. It is, however, surprising, and it is certainly very significant, that the origin of so many designs can now be determined, although they are of unknown age.
It is therefore not too much to say that savages do not deliberately invent patterns or designs; in other words, artistic expression is the result of a pre-existing visual impression.
Great difficulty presents itself when we apply this statement to communities of a higher culture; but there is no reason for believing that the case is different for barbaric races from what it is among the more savage.
It is when we come to highly civilised people that the problem becomes well-nigh insoluble. People often designedly “invent” patterns, and imagine that such designs are truly original. It is impossible to prove whether or no the artist has ever seen either a similar pattern, or at all events the elements of which his design is composed. It is very difficult to conceive that the latter is not the case. All that we can do is to fall back on the simple conditions, and we have already seen what obtains there.
This argument is strengthened by the fact that those who wish to “invent” new designs so often have recourse to objective assistance. The students in our schools of art are instructed to study natural forms, especially plants. Not only have they to manipulate the plant as a whole, but the flower has to be dissected, and even such details as the cross-section of the seed capsule are taken into account. Intelligent selection and rejection and judicious grouping may give rise to an infinitude of designs and patterns.
More mechanical aids are often pressed into service, and the compasses and other drawing instruments are employed, perhaps as often on the chance of a pleasing combination resulting or being suggested, as to elaborate some definite idea. The well-known Japanese pattern books afford a good foreign example of this method.
Instructors have not overlooked such optical aids as the kaleidoscope or analogous apparatus for pattern-making.