But this is not the place to teach you perspective. It is a subject which requires special study, and whole volumes are given to the elucidation of it. In a work of this kind anything more than a mention of the bearings of perspective on painting would be out of place. If you do not care to take up seriously the study of perspective, avoid attempting to paint any subjects which call for it; or, if you do care to study it, get a special work on that subject, give plenty of time to it, and study it thoroughly.
Foreshortening.—In this connection I may speak of something which is akin to perspective, yet the very reverse of it. As its name implies, foreshortening means the way in which anything seems shortened or in modified drawing as it projects towards you; while perspective is the manner in which lines appear as they recede from you. Like aërial perspective, the best way to study foreshortening is to study nature, not rules.
Perspective can be worked out by rule, foreshortening cannot. Pose your model, or if it be a branch of a tree, or anything of that sort, place yourself in the proper position with reference to it, and then study the drawing as it appears, thinking nothing of how it is; make your measurements, and place your lines as if there were no problem of foreshortening at all, but study the relations of lines, of size, and of values, and the foreshortening will take care of itself.
After all, foreshortening is only good drawing, and a good draughtsman will foreshorten well, while a bad draughtsman will not. Therefore, learn to draw, and don't worry about the foreshortening.
CHAPTER XIX
LIGHT AND SHADE
Chiaroscuro.—A few words about chiaroscuro will be useful. This is a term of great importance and frequent use with artists and writers up to within the last thirty or forty years. It has of late become almost unused. The reason for this was explained in the chapter on "Values." Nevertheless, it is well that the student should know what the word meant, and still means. Although he may hear and use it less frequently than if he had lived earlier in the century, the pictures, certain qualities of which no other word expresses, still exist, and are probably as immortal as anything in this world can be. He should know what those qualities are, and he should understand their relation to the work of to-day.
Chiaroscuro is described by an old writer as suggesting "a theme which is the most interesting, perhaps, in the whole range of the art of painting. Of vast importance, great extent, and extreme intricacy. Chiaroscuro is an Italian compound word whose two parts, chiar and oscuro, signify simply bright and obscure, or light and dark. Hence the art or branch of art that bears the name regards all the relations of light and shade, and this independently of coloring, notwithstanding that in painting, coloring and the clair-obscure are of their very nature inseparable. The art of clair-obscure, therefore, teaches the painter the disposition and arrangement in general of his lights and darks, with all their degrees, extreme and intermediate, of tint and shade, both in single objects, as the parts of a picture, and in combination as one whole, so as to produce the best representation possible in the best manner possible; that is, so as to produce the most desirable effect upon the senses and spirit of the observers. In a word, its end and aim are fidelity and beauty of imitation; its means, every effect of light; chromatic harmonies and contrasts; chromatic values, reflections; the degradations of atmospheric perspective, etc." The italics are mine.