“‘There is as much finish in the right concealment of things as in the right exhibition of them.’
“Here is a key to the very heart of nature, if one will only use it. And I would but add my faint echo in an entreaty for a deeper sense of the infinity of nature’s living tone and palpitating color—a plea for the more intelligent recognition of the elements that yield the tint which we vainly strive to imitate upon the canvas. Such knowledge will give a voice to every pigment on the palette, and to the brush an answering consciousness; for, whether disciple of a school or not, whether artist, poet, or layman, who can deny that such an attitude toward nature shall yield a harvest of deeper knowledge, and increased delight, not merely in the contemplation of the footprint, but even as truly in the study of the limitless panorama?
“Is there not to me an added charm in the pink flush that mantles the side of yonder mountain-spur when I know so well that it is shed by the myriads of blossoms in an acre of glowing fire-weed? And as my eye follows the cool cloud-shadow as it glides down upon the mountain-slope, among the varied patchwork of its fields and farms, is there not a deepened significance imparted to every separate tint that tells me something of its being?
“If in the faint yellow checkered forms I see fields of billowing wheat and barley, and recall a hundred of their associations, or if from that quaintly-dotted patch there comes a whiff from a sweet-scented field, with its cocks of new-mown hay, its skimming swallows and ringing scythes, with here a luminous gray of sandy meadow fresh from the plough or harrow, and there a weed-grown copse lit up with golden-rod; if that kaleidoscopic medley of grays and olives and browns tells me of its pastures, with their tinkling bells, of its fragrant beds of everlasting, ferns, and hardhack, its trailing junipers and its moss-flecked bowlders, and each of these in turn draws me still closer, and whispers something of itself—the everlasting with its pendent jewel, the orchis with its little confidant and nursling, the gentian with its close-kept secret and its never-opened eye; if yonder bluish bloom means a field of blueberries to me, and that snowy sweep brings visions of the blossoming buckwheat field, with its symphony of humming bees—tell me, have I not only seen the mountain-slope, but have I not also heard its voice?
Such a man could not keep out of the field of color. The feeling in him had to express itself. He must interpret on the canvas what he saw upon the hillside. It was inevitable that he should soon win as hearty praise for his color as he had for his drawing. Of course, the reputation could not be as wide as that he had achieved as illustrator in black and white. Fewer eyes could see his paintings than had been regaled with his illustrations. But when he laid down his brush, to paint no more, he had made a name for himself as one of the foremost American water-colorists.
It is but fair to say that his later experiences taught him a larger respect for “oil” as a medium of artistic expression. He was so eager to enlarge his field of work that he could not but venture upon experiments which brought to him a new sense of power and a knowledge of resources hitherto untouched. A few brief entries in his journal show his state of mind, and his prompt surrender of former prejudices. In March, 1881, he wrote:
“Painting for three weeks on oil-pictures for Academy Exhibition. First attempts in oil for exhibition. Trouble with medium. Final triumph of mind over matter. Painted a week or more on large autumn study commenced at Williamstown. Grew frantic and in a moment of frenzy took a piece of pasteboard and palette-knife and produced strongest picture I ever painted, in less than fifteen minutes,—a revelation which gave me confidence. A victorious fight with an oil-tube which had threatened to get the better of me.”
A few days later he tried a similar study, with which he was even more satisfied. In another entry he says of this attempt:
“Much pleased with effect of sky I carried picture to a finish by four o’clock. Went out and ordered frame for it. A Diaz effect,—quite strong. What a revelation to me who, ten days ago, was disgusted with oil-color as a medium! I am all aglow with enthusiasm at finding another medium for the expression of my thoughts and feelings.”
From this time forward he knew that there were still greater possibilities before him than he had realized, and with the knowledge came a fresh ambition, a stronger challenge to his artistic nature.