After some experience in handling five or seven tones, the student can undertake original composition. For a beginning pure landscape may be best, taking some of the subjects previously used.
Follow this with landscape and figures; groups of figures with landscape background; figures in interiors; and portrait sketches.
Compose for a book-page, using one light gray value to represent the effect of type, as in No. 58, opposite. Paint very freely, without too much thought of scales and intervals. Let gradations enter where needed for finer effect. Study the work of the best illustrators, noting the tone-scheme and the placing upon the page.
ETCHING
Etching, pen drawing and pencil sketching are line-arts. The needle, pen and lead pencil are tools for drawing lines, and there is much reason in Whistler's contention that tone and shading should not be attempted with them. The tool always gives character to work, and the best results are obtained when the possibilities of tools and materials are fully appreciated. If a sharp point is used in drawing, it will produce pure line, whose quality may reach any degree of excellence. Whistler, in his etchings, worked for the highest type of line-beauty; shadows and tones were felt, but not expressed. On the other hand the artist is not subject to restrictions and fixed laws. He cannot allow even a master to interfere with his freedom; there is no “thou shalt” and “thou shalt not” in art. Admitting the value of all the arguments for restricting the use of the needle to line only, the artist observes that clustering of lines inevitably produces tone and suggests massing (notan of line, page 54) that this effect is developed in rich gradations by wiping the etching-plate in the process of printing. Etchers are thus tempted to use tone, and many masters, from Rembrandt down, have worked in tone more often than in line.
PEN DRAWING
is a dry, hard process but one of great value in modern illustration owing to the ease with which it may be reproduced. It need not be as inartistic as it usually appears; observation of pen work will show that, aside from faults in composition, failure in interest lies largely in the handling. Perhaps one pen only is used, and all textures treated alike, whereas every texture should have its own characteristic handling; cross hatching or any uniform system of shading with the pen is deadly. Study the rendering; suggest surface-quality rather than imitate or elaborate; use a variety of pens. Johnston has shown with what art the reed pen may be employed in lettering and illuminating. In comparison with the Japanese brush, the ordinary pen is a clumsy tool, but nevertheless it is capable of much more than is usually gotten with [pg 91]
[pg 92]
