"Do you think it fair that Mr. Ruskin should come to that conclusion?"
"What might be fair to Mr. Ruskin I cannot answer."
"Then you mean, Mr. Whistler, that the initiated in technical matters might have no difficulty in understanding your work. But do you think now that you could make me see the beauty of that picture?"
The witness then paused, and examining attentively the Attorney-General's face and looking at the picture alternately, said, after apparently giving the subject much thought, while the Court waited in silence for his answer:
"No! Do you know I fear it would be as hopeless as for the musician to pour his notes into the ear of a deaf man. (Laughter.)
"I offer the picture, which I have conscientiously painted, as being worth two hundred guineas. I have known unbiassed people express the opinion that it represents fireworks in a night-scene. I would not complain of any person who might simply take a different view."
The Court then adjourned.
The Attorney-General, in resuming his address on behalf of the defendant on Tuesday, said he hoped to convince the jury, before his case closed, that Mr. Ruskin's criticism upon the plaintiff's pictures was perfectly fair and bonâ fide;[1] [1]"Enter now the great room with the Veronese at the end of it, for which the painter (quite rightly) was summoned before the Inquisition of State."—Prof. John Ruskin: Guide to Principal Pictures, Academy of Fine Arts, Venice. and that, however severe it might be, there was nothing that could reasonably be complained of.... Let them examine the nocturne in blue and silver, said to represent Battersea Bridge. What was that structure in the middle? Was it a telescope or a fire-escape? Was it like Battersea Bridge? What were the figures at the top of the bridge? And if they were horses and carts, how in the name of fortune were they to get off? Now, about these pictures, if the plaintiff's argument was to avail, they must not venture publicly to express an opinion, or they would have brought against them an action for damages.
After all, Critics had their uses.[2] [2]"I have now given up ten years of my life to the single purpose of enabling myself to judge rightly of art ... earnestly desiring to ascertain, and to be able to teach, the truth respecting art; also knowing that this truth was by time and labour definitely ascertainable."—Prof. Ruskin: Modern Painters, Vol. III.
"Thirdly, that TRUTHS OF COLOUR ARE THE LEAST IMPORTANT OF ALL TRUTHS."—Mr. Ruskin, Prof, of Art: Modern Painters, Vol. I. Chap. V.
"And that colour is indeed a most unimportant characteristic of objects, would be further evident on the slightest consideration. The colour of plants is constantly changing with the season ... but the nature and essence of the thing are independent of these changes. An oak is an oak, whether green with spring, or red with winter; a dahlia is a dahlia, whether it be yellow or crimson; and if some monster hunting florist should ever frighten the flower blue, still it will be a dahlia; but not so if the same arbitrary changes could be effected in its form. Let the roughness of the bark and the angles of the boughs be smoothed or diminished, and the oak ceases to be an oak; but let it retain its universal structure and outward form, and though its leaves grow white, or pink, or blue, or tri-colour, it would be a white oak, or a pink oak, or a republican oak, but an oak still."—John Ruskin, Esq., M.A., Teacher and Slade Prof. of Fine Arts: Modern Painters. He should like to know what would become of Poetry, of Politics, of Painting, if Critics were to be extinguished? Every Painter struggled to obtain fame.
No Artist could obtain fame, except through criticism.[3] [3]"Canaletto, had he been a great painter, might have cast his reflections wherever he chose ... but he is a little and a bad painter."—Mr. Ruskin, Art Critic.
"I repeat there is nothing but the work of Prout which is true, living, or right in its general impression, and nothing, therefore, so inexhaustively agreeable" (sic).—J. Ruskin, Art Professor: Modern Painters.