Cubists and Post-Impressionism

by Arthur Jerome Eddy

For a long time we have been so influenced by the theories of the Impressionists, the realists, the plein-air school, that we resent it when an artist says, “I will paint something more beautiful than nature; I will paint nature herself more beautiful than she is. I will paint the spirit of nature. I will paint trees that do not look like trees, but will give you the feeling, the dignity, the power of trees. I will paint the earth, not as it looks, but in a way that will give you an impression of its fertility and fecundity. I will paint you flowers, not by faithfully copying them as they are in the field, but as they bloom and blossom in your memory. I will paint you men and women, not as you see them on the street and in the drawing room—superficial resemblances—but as they really are to you and to me, human beings the true significance of which is not expressed in the drooping of a moustache, the lifting of an eyebrow. I will paint them in black or brown or red or blue, or in gold or bronze, as does the sculptor; I will paint them in a way so strange you have never seen the like before, but I will make you feel their humanity.”

To illustrate the arbitrary manner which the great oriental artists use colors to produce harmonious results irrespective of nature, I once used a number of old Chinese paintings borrowed from a famous collection—in each of which the hair of the figures was painted blue.

And why not? Black, brown, or flaxen would not have given the effect the painter desired, any more than C, D, or E would take the place of F in a chord.

The Oriental needs a note of blue and so paints the hair blue. And when one comes to think of it, next to some marvelous shades of red, blue hair is far more positive and picturesque than gray, or yellow, or any black but a glossy raven.

We never think of resenting a terra cotta horse in a print by Hokusai; it does not disturb us because we instinctively recognize the fact that a strong note of terra cotta is needed precisely where it is used—a terra cotta horse, or rock, or man, it matters not.

Human faces of gold, silver, bronze, even marble—that ugliest of all stones, in its natural state—do not worry us.

In fact when we look at marble sculpture we are in the attitude of the man who ordered the painting of the bamboo forest. We are so accustomed to seeing ghostly white marble busts and statues we actually resent it if the sculptor stains or colors the marble not to make it more realistic, but to make it more beautiful.