| 84. Peace. |
| 68. Monte Rosa. Sunset. |
[1] There is a very wonderful, and almost deceptive, imitation of sunlight by Rubens at Berlin. It falls through broken clouds upon angels, the flesh being chequered with sunlight and shade.
[2] Not, accurately speaking, shadow, but dark side. All shadow proper is negative in color, but, generally, reflected light is warmer than direct light; and when the direct light is warm, pure, and of the highest intensity, its reflection is scarlet. Turner habitually, in his later sketches, used vermilion for his pen outline in effects of sun.
[3] The following collected system of the various statements made respecting color in different parts of my works may be useful to the student:—
1st. Abstract color is of far less importance than abstract form (vol. i. chap. v.); that is to say, if it could rest in our choice whether we would carve like Phidias (supposing Phidias had never used color), or arrange the colors of a shawl like Indians, there is no question as to which power we ought to choose. The difference of rank is vast; there is no way of estimating or measuring it.
So, again, if it rest in our choice whether we will be great in invention of form, to be expressed only by light and shade, as Durer, or great in invention and application of color, caring only for ungainly form, as Bassano, there is still no question. Try to be Durer, of the two. So again, if we have to give an account or description of anything—if it be an object of high interest—its form will be always what we should first tell. Neither leopard spots nor partridge’s signify primarily in describing either beast or bird. But teeth and feathers do.
2. Secondly. Though color is of less importance than form, if you introduce it at all, it must be right.
People often speak of the Roman school as if it were greater than the Venetian, because its color is “subordinate.”