Where Art Begins

by Hume Nisbet

‘Living pure, reverent, patient, pitiful, loving all things that live, even as themselves, letting unkindness die, and greed and wrath.’—Buddha.

This is the mission of our sacred art—to educate each soul, painters and people; to subdue the self that is now dominant, and plant the other on its throne; to make men and women of us all, in the highest, truest, grandest sense.

PART II.—THE COMIC SIDE OF ART

Viewed from the outside, that is, the standpoint of the buyer and the critic, the ludicrousness of it is almost appalling. It would be tragic in the intensity of its farcical characters, even as a very hearty laugh sometimes will cause sudden death by choking, were it not for the shades of the pitiful or contemptible which relieve it of the load of laughter, and change the downward curve of the broad grin into a decided upward smiling termination.

I dare say you will think my subject should be composed of illustrations from Cruikshank, Gillray, Leech, and other masters of the comic muse, and so it ought to be, perhaps, and for that very reason I do not feel inclined to treat it so. I do not like to see ladies dress all by the month’s fashion-plates, whether it suits them or not, nor men do exactly the things expected of them. Where would be those delightful throbs of surprise if it were not for the tangent starts of the unconfined lunatics who pass for men and women of talent on this very superficial, thin-crusted globe of ours?

One of the most amusing sides of art is the method people have of judging a picture.

Say an old gentleman with his wife and two or three daughters come by mistake into an exhibition with the catalogue of some other exhibition in their possession. They glance at a picture, and fall into raptures over it: ‘Beautiful, the feeling is delightful. What force of touch, strength of character! Who is it by? Number So-and-So. Ah! I knew it.’ (The number in the wrong catalogue points to a well-known name.) ‘I felt that I could not be mistaken.’ (The old gentleman adjusts his glasses and looks at the title with triumphant conviction.) ‘Odd title, though, for the subject; eccentricity of genius, I suppose. No matter, it is splendid. Quite Dutch-like in its subtlety; quite Israely in its character; delicate, refined, realistic, bold, masterly!’

One of the daughters, blessed with keener vision, has here discovered another signature on the corner of this masterpiece, a name not in the fashion, in fact one despised. ‘Papa, it isn’t by Mr. Smudge, R.A.; it is by Ernest Tyro.’

‘Eh! what? Nonsense! why, the catalogue says Smudge.’ The mistake is discovered, and at once the tune changes. ‘Ah! vulgar, coarse, commonplace. Let us go out before we are contaminated.’