Owen Jones

“ The Assyrian figures, without being embalmed mummies like those of Egypt, show, nevertheless, much stiffness and irregularity; they appear as it were imprisoned and confined within an invisible canvas. Their contours are, so to speak, tacked in with threads. One recognises in them an awkwardness and hardness arising from the contest of the artist with a material foreign to the style: whilst the Egyptian bas-reliefs evince an original, canonical, and voluntary stiffness. ”

“ As the beautiful marble, which forms the cliffs and coasts of Greece, notwithstanding its homogeneous transformation, betrays by veins, by fossils, and other indications, its sedimentary origin, so Hellenism, although it may appear homogeneous, and cast—so to speak—in one single jet, betrays, nevertheless, its secondary origin, and the sediment which constitutes its material groundwork. ”

“ My attempt is seen under every disadvantage; it is too near the eye and too near the light; and it is painted on a material which is most ungracious for the reception of colour. The minute undulations of marble always lose something in a plaster reproduction, but when the plaster has further to be painted with four coats of oil paint to stop the suction, it may readily be imagined how much the more delicate modulations of the surface will suffer. ”

“ He considers it “unreasonable to suppose that the ancients entirely concealed, or even materially altered in appearance, the general surface of the white marble, which they made a great point of obtaining whenever possible; but that no one who has witnessed the painfully dazzling effect of fresh Pentelic marble under the Athenian sun will deny the artistic value of toning down the almost pure white of its polished surface, and the more so when considerable portions of the architecture were painted in the most positive colours. ”

“ The red I have employed appeared to be the best colour for the principal horses, as best balancing by their masses the blue background, whilst the relief between horse and horse could be harmoniously obtained by the employment of grey for the back horses. Authority for this mode of treatment exists on the Greek vases and in the Etruscan tombs, where, when one horse passes before another, there is a change of colour. As the horses in this frieze are in ranks of nine, it is most probable that there was still more variety of colour than I have attempted, to keep the various groups together. ”

“ And those who believe that the marble of the Greeks was only stained and not painted, build up a triumphant argument on this. The explanation, however, is very simple; it is evident that the smooth portions of a coloured object would lose their colour first under the influence of time, and, in fact, all traces of colour that ever are found, are found in the folds and crevices, from which it is fairly argued that the surface of which they formed a part was of that colour. ”

“ There are other considerations which would lead one to imagine it destined to receive colour, even had no traces of colour been found on the architecture above and around it. As there are still many who believe, and will believe against all evidence, that this frieze never was painted, I must bring forward some arguments which appear to me so strong as to render the idea of its colourless state impossible. ”

“ I am convinced that the style of Doric polychromy was essentially different to that of the Ionic, which was, notwithstanding, of equal antiquity and originality.
Doric polychromy was based on the Egyptian system, whilst that of Ionia was based on Asiatic models. The first named was lapidary; the colours were detached on a whitish or yellowish ground; there was no gilding, and the use of blue was common, that being the holy colour of the Egyptians (a turquoise blue) , the symbolic colour of the priesthood and aristocracy. ”

“ The system of Greek polychromy is the richest of all those of antiquity; but it is, apparently, based neither on a principle of construction or material as among the Assyrians, nor on a hierarchical principle as among the Egyptians. The most striking oppositions of principle are found united in it and harmonised, a more artistic and elevated, but less positive conception. ”

“ The marble statues of Ægina, and others, that are works of truly fine art, offer a second form of the application of colour. Here the eyes, lips, draperies, ornaments, and details of arms, have their true local colour, but the monuments themselves only give us the negative evidence with respect to the flesh, that if coloured at all, it must have been less solidly. ”

“ We are therefore driven to the remains of colour on other monuments, and to analogy for the proposed restoration of the several colours.
BACKGROUND. The colour of the background of some of the pediments of the Greek temples is known to have been blue, and if we admit that the bodies of the figures were painted at all, it could have been no other colours. The flesh colour being necessarily some kind of red, would have been injured by a red ground, while yellow would have advanced to the eye, and can form a background only to white, the only colour more advancing than itself. ”

“ But when it is seen, by the testimony of ancient writers, such as Plato, Pliny, Plutarch, and Virgil, that the Greek artists did colour their statues, the fact of the statues being discovered with traces of colour is explained, while on the other hand this fact helps to clear away all trace of doubt which might linger in a supposed equivocalness in the passages from ancient writers. ”

“ In the first place, the reader must get out of all sculpture galleries, erase from his mind all preconceptions derived from antique remains and modern practices. Having done so, let him reflect on the historical development of sculpture, and he will see this idea of painted figures falling in its true place.
Sculpture of course began in Greece, as elsewhere, with idols. It is the custom of all barbarous nations to colour their idols. The Egyptians, as we know beyond all doubt, not only coloured, but dressed theirs. ”

“ In the flutes of the Ionic columns of the Erectheum red has been distinctly seen. This can only have been the ground for gold; the fillets which separate the flutes of the Ionic column may then have been white, but the flutes of the Doric column presenting a sharp arris, which could not receive colour to separate the colours of the flutes, the columns must have had one uniform tint, whatever it might have been, and we can conceive no other worthy of such a building as the Parthenon, or able to support the decoration above, but gold. ”

“ Even in the Alhambra, which was entirely covered with colour, and which is so many centuries nearer our time than the Greek temples, colour is but rarely found on the surface: it is only by what is found in the depths and hollows, that we know how the whole was coloured.
On the terra-cottas of the Louvre there are figures where the white ground with which the whole surface of the terra-cottas 22was covered, remains perfect over the whole of the figures, at the same time that a fragment of flesh tint still remains upon some portion of it. ”

“ I would ask those critics who stand on the ground of traditional opinion, not too rashly by hard words to attempt to stop the inquiry which this experiment may suggest. The facts are too strong to be put aside by any opinion. If all who are anxious for the truth will only seek it, there is little doubt that we may approach, if we do not reach it. ”

“ I forget whether the hair was found to be coloured, but the absence of traces of colour on the flesh, while they were abundant elsewhere, indicates that if coloured at all it must have been by a different and more perishable process—by a tint, or stain, or varnish. The Æginetan statues being archaic, do not give an absolute rule for those of Phidias. The archaic Athenian bas-relief of a warrior in excellent preservation, shows vivid colours on drapery and ornaments of armour, and the eye-balls were also coloured ”

“ The Persian monuments of Murgaub and Istakir, afford us the means of observing the second step which decorative art made towards the principle of construction. They were composed, like their models in Assyria, of unbaked bricks, of which nothing remains, whilst however, the direction of the walls is still indicated by marble pillars, which originally served to strengthen the angles of the walls, and by the jambs of doors and windows and by niches, with which the walls were ornamented. ”

“ As all the ornaments on Greek vases are analogous to those of Greek temples, it is fairly concluded that the painter of the columns on the vases only represented what he was accustomed to see on the columns of buildings.
I am not alone in the belief that the echinus was ornamented with the egg-and-tongue ornament; in fact, the form of the moulding suggests this in preference to any other. It certainly gives the best form for resolving the upward running-lines of the flutes. ”

“ In the first place veins do not so run in marble as to represent flesh; in the second, unless statues were usually coloured, such veins, if they existed, would be regarded as terrible blemishes, and the very thing the Greeks are supposed to have avoided—viz., colour as representing reality—would have been shown. ”

“ The construction, though massive and real, is always hidden, and does not enter yet as an ornamental motive in the compositions of the architect.
It is worthy of observation, that one of the mouldings of Egyptian architecture seems to be explained by the same ancient custom of encrusting brick buildings with stone slabs, which we have remarked on the Assyrian monuments. I allude to the torus moulding which encloses the external walls of edifices. It served to hide the joints of the slabs which covered the internal work. ”

“ Nicias was an encaustic painter, and hence it seems clear that his circumlitio—his mode of finishing the statues, so highly prized by Praxiteles—must have been the application of encaustic painting to those parts which the sculptor wished to have ornamented. For it is quite idle to suppose a sculptor like Praxiteles would allow another sculptor to finish his works. The rough work may be done by other hands, but the finishing is always left to the artist. ”

“ The treatment of statues is referred by Vitruvius specially to the nude; it seems, therefore, to have had connection with a design to assist or heighten the effect of the sculptured nude flesh, as distinguished from drapery, &c. This would be natural enough, though no colours were employed, or not for every part, but if they were we must suppose that Vitruvius has vermilion in his mind leading him to limit his observation. Pliny’s expression shows that even assuming colour there is no opaqueness in question. ”

“ On examining somewhat attentively the Assyrian sculptures, it is easy to satisfy oneself that the art of the Assyrian sculptor moved within limits traceable from its origin, viz., embroidered work, allowance being made for certain alterations of style, caused by the requirements of a new material. ”

“ The same observation applies to the Palace of Osirtesen at Karnak, the walls of which are panelled with slabs of polished red granite, bearing the traces of a transparent coating with which they were covered.
THE CHINESE. China is a country where architecture has remained stationary from its early birth, and, consequently, the elementary motives of it are most distinctly preserved; they are placed side by side, without being conjoined by a general ruling idea. The external surface of the wall is still quite independent of the wall itself, and indeed is most frequently movable. ”

“ They are comparatively modern in principle and in date; but they furnish us, nevertheless, with very important hints on the history of polychromy.
The frequent use of stucco, which is better made in India than anywhere else, recals the system of the ancients, in covering their fine hewn stonework with a very fine and hard incrustation of stucco.
The Indian edifices constitute, as it were, but a scaffolding from which to hang the drapery forming divisions of their spaces, as in China, and as formerly in Assyria, Egypt, and Greece. ”

“ When we consider the brilliancy of Pentelic marble when fresh worked, there appears a reason for using colours beyond that of imitating the usages of Attica, in more ancient temples, namely, that the minutiæ of the work in many parts would have been lost to the eye amidst the general brilliancy. ”

“ Those who are inclined to believe that wherever the Greeks ornamented, there traces of ornament are found, and that consequently where no ornament is found none existed, of course stop at the stage represented by the outline diagram, and believe that the general harmony which such partial ornamenting would disturb was restored by covering all the plain parts with stains or tints which may or may not have been varied. ”

“ The green is a colour which occurs frequently on the Athenian temples, so on the leaves on the moulding which runs under the frieze of the opisthodome of the temple of Theseus, and between the red and blue leaves of the capitals of the antæ. ”

“ It would be important to follow up these vestiges of rudimentary Hellenism, since they might enlighten us on certain phenomena in Hellenic art, which have been up to the present time inexplicable without them. ”

“ The argument for colour on marble flesh of the best age, from existing remains, so far as I am aware, is equal to zero. But the passage respecting Nicias and Polycletus, is of very great force. There is no escape from its application to marble statues, nor from the great skill that there was occasion and scope for in the circumlitio. ”