All this is perfectly resonable and not especially technical. It is conveyd in stray hints rather than in any set discussion of light effects in any one place. Often, too, Tieck's dislike for some other aspect of a painter's work leads him astray on this point. This is tru in the case of Northcote, whose really good treatment of the high lights Tieck has in one or two cases entirely overlookt. There seems to hav been a distinct appeal made, too, by the sheen and glitter of certain textiles and the scintillating, flickering light of the later periods of Tieck's work is presaged as erly as this. On the whole, however, it is not the glitter of the world of out-of-doors, but of the world of the shut-in, of the world of little things which appeals so strongly to Tieck and which he treated with such banality in the story "Ulrich der Empfindsame."
Thus, Tieck's landscape criticism is very bad and even tho, as has been pointed out, the basis for his adjectivs lies in the Anzeigen articles, his expansion beyond them brings no real betterment. In the plate from "Love's Labor Lost" (IV, 1, page 9), when Tieck was feeling his way into his subject, his general impression was one of plesure, and so the landscape is "reizend." In the whole essay, "reizend" is the only constructiv epithet applied to landscape and it occurs only twice. Hamilton's landscape is purely conventional and, except for a vista, of which Tieck was all his life fond, offers nothing to commend it. The failure of Tieck to judge rightly must be laid at the door of too great reliance on the Anzeigen.
Tieck criticizes only one other landscape as such, tho in a third case a landscape background is discust adversly. For the scene from "As You Like It" in which Jacques watches the wounded deer the term "reizend" seems quite impossible. Engraved by Middiman after Hodges, a combination which augurs ill, the scene is without dout the worst in every way that Tieck saw. The composition is bad: Jacques, a figure without grace of expression, sprawls in a comedy landscape and the features of the wounded deer hav a strong Hebraic cast. Here, if ever, the scene is drawn from the stage and not from nature and stage properties are models for tree and foliage. When Tieck says that the scene is one to arouse cheerfulness in the beholder, he is correct but not in the sense that he ment. The reliance on his source is not enuf to account for his aberration; the failure to judge aright must be laid at Tieck's door.
After pointing out the value of the whole, and the effect made by the light of the torch held by Gloster ("Lear," III, 4), Tieck shows that this effect, striking as it is, detracts from the unity of the composition, since it shifts the emfasis from Lear and his pain. Lear, morover, is not the Lear of Shakspere but a giant, and the effect of this Herculean form is made further improbable by the exaggeration of the wind blowing from all directions in the picture and driving the garments of Lear with it, winding them impossibly about him. The effect of these draperies, says Tieck, is baroque and there is no thought of quiet strength or noble simplicity.[28]
In the composition of this picture Tieck also notises that the figure of Edgar is practically the same as that of a figure in West's Deth of General Wolf. A comparison with the latter picture at once reveals the justness of Tieck's observation. The figure of the Indian seated in the foreground is strikingly like that of Edgar, both in form and in general expression, and it is evident that West has repeated himself. In general, Tieck does not make comparisons of this kind. He confines his remarks to the picture itself, and probably was not well acquainted with the run of contemporary British art.[29]
Tieck's judgment of composition did not go far beyond this emfasis on the principal figure. A general series of colorless frases like "gut geordnet" occurs, but expresses only a mild acquiescence in the arrangement. Tieck was fond of the posing sentimentalities of groups like the landscape plate from "Love's Labor Lost," but he tries hard to get away from them toward a realism which drew upon actual perception for its postulates and which was not based upon premises—inadequate for art—of Shakspere illustration. On the other hand, and here he departs constantly from the canon of Lessing, there is no striving for abstract beauty. Charm and grace, beauty in motion as it is exprest by the female figure in Anne Page and a few other cases, are Tieck's nearest approach to it.[30]
The general reason for Tieck's failure is that in actuality these pictures were not ugly or inartistic to him. Where he criticizes it is oftenest the idea; the execution and the relation to an abstract standard are of less consequence, and his theory once more limps behind his practis. He may berate Hogarth as an artist without beauty but it is clear that his extoling of Rafael is a mere matter of fashion; he is in the same category with Domenichino, whom Tieck's generation and the next succeeding one considerably overestimated. In Michaelangelo, Tieck knows the strength of the drawing and not the wistfulness that pervades even the most Titanic of the master's creations. In general, affectation of pose, mannerism and preciosity are Tieck's bane only where the sentimental is not concernd.
An interesting commendation of the composition of a plate is that of Kirk's picture from "Titus Adronicus" (IV, 1). Tieck likes the plate because of its taste and delicacy in only suggesting the mutilated arms of Lavinia. Kirk has avoided the frank naturalism of the original by the use of draperies, and this appeals to Tieck as a toning down and is in line with what had been suggested before in regard to Tieck's attitude.
This plate has an accessory which Tieck objects to, namely the over large colum in the background. Usually, but not in this case, Tieck criticises the accessories from the standpoint of the stickler for historical accuracy, rather than for any artistic merit or demerit. So the tomb of the Capulets in "Romeo and Juliet" is not Italian of the period, and the dresses of the women in "Merry Wives" are in violation of the sumptuary laws of the time.[31] In the deth of Mortimer (1 "Henry VI.," V, 2) the family tree lying on the ground adds a tuch of symbolism which Tieck approves, tho in the same scene he criticizes the mean character of the prison, saying that for such a noble prisoner a better place of incarceration would hav been found.
Tieck makes no clear distinction between passing expression (Ausdruck) and permanency of feature (Miene). His discussion of expression goes hand in hand with composition, since, as was mentiond above, composition has so close a relation to the placing of the principal character. There is a definit point of view, however, in Tieck's discussions of composition; in his strictures and encomiums on expression of face and figure it is practically impossible to find a consistent pou sto. In places, his powers of observation seem to hav deserted him and his lapses are not attributable to a too great leaning on the articles in the Anzeigen. Tieck's theoretical discussion of the common-sense element in these illustrations may be ever so clear and his demands on the artist may be ever so high, but his practical application of these principles is by no means as strict as might be expected. Indeed, in theory Tieck demands one thing and in practis another.