Fig. 155
Here the movements come together in another way.
The number and variety of these illustrations might, of course, be indefinitely increased. Those which I have given will, I think, serve to define the principal modes of line-composition, when the lines are such as we choose to draw.
THE COMPOSITION OF
VARIOUS LINES
105. In most of the examples I have given I have used repetitions of the same line or similar lines. When the lines which are put together are not in harmony, when they are drawn, as they may be, without any regard to the exigencies of orderly composition, the problem becomes one of doing the best we can with our terms. We try for the greatest possible number of orderly connections, connections making for Harmony, Balance, and Rhythm. We arrange the lines, so far as possible, in the same directions, giving them similar attitudes, getting, in details, as much Harmony of Direction and of Attitudes as possible, and establishing as much Harmony of Intervals as possible between the lines. By spacing and placing we try to get differences of character as far as possible into regular alternations or gradations in which there will be a suggestion either of Harmony or of Rhythm. A suggestion of Symmetry is sometimes possible. Occult Balance is possible in all cases, as it depends, not upon the terms balanced, but upon the indication of a center of attractions by a symmetrical framing of them.
Let us take seven lines, with a variety of shape-character, with as little Shape-Harmony as possible, and let us try to put these lines together in an orderly way.
Fig. 156
With these lines, which show little or no harmony of character, which agree only in tone and in width-measure, lines which would not be selected certainly as suitable material for orderly compositions, I will make three compositions, getting as much Order into each one as I can, just to illustrate what I mean. I shall not be able to achieve a great deal of Order, but enough, probably, to satisfy the reader that the effort has been worth while.