The use of gold as an isolator has long been established in the form of picture frames—the gilded “flat” or moulding clearing a picture from its surroundings more effectually and easily than any other known method; but the picture frame, as I think I have before said, is only a relic of the architectural relation of the picture to the wall, where it originally formed a panel, as may be seen, for instance, in the Vandyke room at Wilton House.
Gold also forms a most valuable field or ground for colours, as in decorative painting and mosaic work, or may be used in painting with charming effect as a colour, as the early painters used it, for rich brocades and patterned stuffs, rays of light, the emblazoning of heraldic devices, inscriptions, and small fine details of all kinds.
Gold in Byzantine art always seems to have been used with a sense of dignity and of solemnity. The gold tesseræ which form the field of the mosaic decoration in the subdued light in St. Mark’s at Venice impress one with an effect of quiet splendour. There is nothing gaudy or flaming. The light falls through the narrow windows of the dome, and moves softly over the concave gilded surface, reflected backwards and forwards in every variety of tone as the sunlight travels, and the great figures and emblems loom majestically and mysteriously upon the gold field.
Another splendid example, and again chiefly a harmony of blue and gold, is seen in that exquisite gem of architecture and mosaic decoration, the Cappella Palatina in the Royal Palace at Palermo.
The Double Cube Room, Wilton House
From a Photograph by Brooks and Son, Salisbury
The opposite principle in the use of gilding is illustrated in St. Peter’s at Rome, and in many renascence interiors when the mouldings, capitals, cornices, and architectural enrichments of all kinds in relief are picked out in gold. The splendour may be there—if only in the impression of costliness—but it seems of a more obvious kind, more conscious and self-assertive, and when the principle is carried thoroughly out of gilding every prominence, the effect may easily become ostentatious and vulgar.
I think it is important not to lose the sense of preciousness in the use of gilding, and, as with costly marbles and beautiful materials of all kinds, one should be careful not to put them to base uses, or lose their artistic value by excess.
It is comparatively easy to offer up pious opinions on the use of gold; but the real problems only begin in front of the particular work in hand, and the conditions under which the decorative artist works continually vary. One may be guided by certain principles, but much more by feeling and judgement, which go to form what is called taste. Every work must be finer in proportion to the thought and feeling put into it, but no amount of gold-leaf will cover the absence of taste and sense of proportion.