For in all low-relief work one will find the artist to be showing a preference either for form and the structural character of the subject, or for its colour qualities, represented by delicate variations in the planes, which produce a corresponding warmth of delicate light and shade; in a word, he feels his subject either in the round or in the flat. Which you yourself will prefer is a question of your point of view. Among brother artists who are painters there will probably be a verdict in favour of the second group, since it represents more closely what they themselves strive for, and are therefore partial to. And its pictorial quality may equally recommend it also to general approbation. For, indeed, such a portrait as that of M. Vadé is unquestionably fascinating. There is in it scarce any resort to lines, the modelling being effected almost entirely by planes, at once broad and subtle, full of a sense of colour and giving an expression of dreaminess to the face. Yet, if one compares this portrait with either of the three included in the former group, it is to find in the latter a compensating virility of expression, a greater dignity of structure and of character.
It is not usual to find these two very opposite motives of technique united in one artist. But in Brenner’s case it seems to result from an absence of all artistic parti pris, and from the freshness of interest with which he attacks each subject, so that the latter itself reveals to him the more appropriate manner of presenting it. In the portrait shown in the accompanying illustration the two motives seem to be combined.
XII
THE DECORATIVE MOTIVE
IN all ages sculpture has been intimately allied with architecture, somewhat as the blossom with the tree, reaching often its noblest expression as an efflorescence of decoration upon the surface of a building or as separate forms within it; springing up in statue, tomb or pulpit like bursts of flowery growth in the forest. Nature in a marvellous way adapts the colour and forms of the blossoms to the character and structure of the tree and shapes of the woodland flowers; for example, the foxglove spiring up amid the tree trunks to the character of its environment. In the spirit of this example the sculptor fashions his designs in conformity with that of the architecture, whether it be for decoration of the building’s surface or for a separate contributing feature.
Such coöperation with the architect demands at once fertility of imagination and considerable self-restraint; an appreciation of the larger qualities of design as displayed in the architecture, mingled with a natural feeling for the charm of minute and exquisite workmanship; a personal feeling, subordinated to the main design, yet in this subordination finding an increase of force. For the modelled ornament is itself enriched by its enrichment of the wall-surface; and the statue which has fine architecture for its setting receives therefrom additional dignity, provided always that the sculptor has adapted the lines of his figure to those of the architecture. If he miss the spirit of the latter and design his subject independently his statue loses the benefit of the alliance and its importance is overpowered by the necessary predominance of the architectural effect. Nor is the failure to secure harmonious relation between the sculpture and the architecture always to be laid to the sculptor. The architect’s design may be lacking in taste and dignity; or, if good in itself, yet without adequate or any provision for sculptural embellishment; the latter being resorted to as an afterthought. Examples of this kind are not infrequent.
The best opportunity that we have in this country of studying sculpture in its relation to architecture is in the Library of Congress, for here the design was deliberately planned to include sculpture and painted decoration, and on a scale of unusual magnitude. Some critics are disposed to complain of an overelaboration in the decorative scheme, but at least every item of the sculpture was organic and structural in intention. We may differ, that is to say, as to the propriety of introducing so much embellishment, but the latter everywhere grows naturally out of its position and has its closely planned function in the general design.
The sculptural decoration of the staircase hall was entrusted to Philip Martiny, except the figures in the spandrils over the main arch which fronts you as you enter. These were executed by Olin L. Warner—whose work has been reviewed in another chapter—and in their Greek-like monumental simplicity and repose, their freedom from all accessory aids to decoration and their avowal of the decorative value of pure form they are in marked contrast to the French spirit of Martiny’s work. For the latter, a naturalised Frenchman, represents the French training, comparatively unaffected by the American environment. As a boy he was employed with his father in modelling and carving ornamental designs; thus gaining a familiarity with ornament before he proceeded to study it systematically as a designer, from which stage he passed on to the further studies of a sculptor of the figure. The feeling for decoration is with him an instinct, cultivated in the best of all schools, that of practical experience; his knowledge of historic forms a habit of memory, and his versatility in adapting, skill in device and manipulative facility, the product of habitual practice.
For the newel posts of the staircase he executed the female figures holding a torch aloft; but these reveal mainly the results of good teaching. They are not a personal expression of himself. In a seated figure, however, designed as a Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Memorial for Jersey City, he reached a very considerable degree of monumental dignity; yet it still appears to be true that his real bent is toward decoration. In this he displays creative fancy and a most charming faculty in the use of form. Witness this marble balustrade, divided into compartments by a series of plain posts, between which are suspended festoons of fruit and flowers, with baby forms astride them. Each in a vein of playful fancy personifies some occupation, art or science, and the emblems typifying them are introduced as accents of surprise in the composition. The whole is alive with graceful animation and yet preserves a rhythmical dignity, a variety in uniformity, like the play of notes in succeeding bars of music.