In a very large number of cases what I have termed the four needs of man act and react upon one another, so that it is often difficult or impossible to distinguish between them, nor do I profess to do so in every case. It is sufficient for our present purpose to acknowledge their existence and to see how they may affect the form, decoration, or representation of objects.
Having stated the objects for which these representations are made, we must pass to a few other general considerations.
It is probable that suggestion in some cases first turned the human mind towards representation. A chance form or contour suggested a resemblance to something else. From what we know of the working of the mind of savages, a mere resemblance is sufficient to indicate an actual affinity. These chance resemblances have occupied a very important place in what has been termed sympathetic magic, and natural objects which suggest other objects are frequently slightly carved, engraved, or painted in order to increase the fancied resemblance. A large number of examples of this can be culled from the writings of missionaries and others, or seen in large ethnographical collections. Mr. H. Balfour[1] has also given one or two interesting illustrations of this process. For example, a stone which suggests a human face is noted by a native and the features are slightly emphasised, and ultimately the object may become a fetich or a charm. The mandrake (Mandragora) is very important in sympathetic magic,[2] and its human attributes have been suggested by the two roots which diverge from a common underground portion, and which recall the body and legs of a man; a slight amount of carving will considerably assist nature and a vegetable man results.
Suggestion does not operate only at the inception of a representation or design, but it acts continuously, and may at various times cause strange modifications to occur.
Expectancy, as Dr. Colley March has pointed out; has been a very important factor in the history of art. This is intimately connected with the association of ideas. If a particular form or marking was natural to a manufactured object, the same form and analogous marking would be given to a similar object made in a different manner, and which was not conditioned by the limitations of the former. For beautiful and convincing illustrations of the operation of this mental attitude of expectancy the reader is referred to the section on skeuomorphic pottery (p. [97]).
We may regard suggestion and expectancy as the dynamic and static forces operating on the arts of design; the former initiates and modifies, the latter tends to conserve what already exists.
It is the play between these two operations which gives rise to what may be termed a distinctive “life-history” of artistic representations.
A life-history consists of three periods: birth, growth, death. The middle period is one which is usually marked by modifications which may conveniently be grouped under the term of evolution, as they imply a gradual change or metamorphosis, or even a series of metamorphoses.
For our present purpose we may recognise three stages of artistic development—origin, evolution, and decay.
The vast bulk of artistic expression owes its birth to realism; the representations were meant to be life-like, or to suggest real objects; that they may not have been so was owing to the apathy or incapacity of the artist or to the unsuitability of his materials.