Western art

“ But anxious as one is to consider in a favourable light whatever artistic creation emanates from the land which inspired and nourished Western art in its infancy, it is impossible to regard their war posters with anything more than an indulgent eye. ”

“ I daresay many of you will remember how emphatically those who first had to do with the movement of which the foundation of our art-schools was a part, called the attention of our pattern-designers to the beautiful works of the East. This was surely most well judged of them, for they bade us look at an art at once beautiful, orderly, living in our own day, and above all, popular. Now, it is a grievous result of the sickness of civilisation that this art is fast disappearing before the advance of western conquest and commerce—fast, and every day faster. ”

“ The opposition of painting-style and drawing-style 250is but a particular aspect of the general opposition of historical and ahistorical form, of assertion and denial of inner development, of eternity and instantaneity. A Classical art-work is an event, a Western is a deed. The one symbolizes the here-and-now point, the other the living course. And the physiognomy of this script of the brush—an ornamentation that is entirely new, infinitely rich and personal, and peculiar to the Western Culture—is purely and simply musical. ”

“ Instead, we have set up the idea of the Destiny of an art, and admitted arts to be organisms of the Culture, organisms which are born, ripen, age and for ever die.
When the Renaissance—its last illusion—closes, the Western soul has come to the ripe consciousness of its own strength and possibilities. It has chosen its arts. As a “late” period, the Baroque knows, just as the Ionic had 282known, what the form-language of its arts has to mean. From being a philosophical religion, art has to be a religious philosophy. ”

“ The artists of the West are all telling more or less of this grand story of Nature's perfect self; all growing in appreciation of the truly beautiful. They are the art pioneers of this Greater West, and like all pioneers of any newly-discovered country, they must work patiently and unfailingly. ”

“ The revival of classical literature in western Europe gave an impetus to the movement which was largely intended to enfold art within the shelter of an enlightened taste, and protect it from the licence of unordered enthusiasm. ”

“ Others of secondary and tertiary importance will be touched upon as their art, their interest, or their significance in the interpretation of Western life, may suggest and a fairly complete survey of contemporary Western literature be attained. The term "Western literature" is, however, misleading if not altogether foolish. It implies a separateness, a category which has, or should have, nothing to do with art or its appraisement. Art is universal. ”

“ Whoever is inclined to disagree with these judges and with those art critics of Europe and America who assert that in an aesthetic sense the people of the Orient are cultured to a standard beyond the comprehension of the Western world, should remember that the taste for any kind of art is based on convention and is largely a matter of cultivation. ”

“ It is not only in the literature of the Middle Ages that we find the thought and life of the people reflected, but in the art as well, for painters, sculptors, and builders were at work in every country of western Europe. ”

“ It is not Classical, but it is a dream of Classical existence, the only dream of the Faustian soul in which it was able to forget itself.
239 VI And now, with the 16th Century, the decisive epochal turn begins for Western painting. The trusteeship of architecture in the North and that of sculpture in Italy expire, and painting becomes polyphonic, “picturesque,” infinity-seeking. The colours become tones. The art of the brush claims kinship with the style of cantata and madrigal. The technique of oils becomes the basis of an art that means to conquer space and to dissolve things in that space. ”

“ The contours and modelling of the main forms are thus treated with the greatest boldness and breadth, and at the same time with a firmness and decision which are the exact opposites of the halting rhythm of many Western experimentalists of modern times, who, without an age-long tradition of culture to guide them, try to invoke the spirit of the East. ”

“ This came with fulness in the twelfth century, and along with it the emotionalizing, the veritable humanizing, of religious art began. Yet the artists of western Europe still lacked the skill requisite for delicate execution. ”

“ Little decorative touches that to the untaught Western eye are introduced merely to give an artistic finish to an involved design, or to give room for bringing in the bit of color demanded by the sense of harmony, have all a meaning not necessarily connected with art. While in the West the problems of art are dealt with by men whose eyes are bent on art alone, the Oriental artist solves these problems while keeping his eyes fixed upon religion. ”

“ Seeing some paintings in the West you will mistake them for real natural objects. With respect to this country also, when in ancient times sculpture attained a high degree of perfection, if you look at a statue of the period it will make you forget the material world and transport you to a new ideal world. As in Western countries paintings like those of former times are not produced now, so in our country also, attempts to give expression to original ideas in art are no longer seen. For example, the paintings from your art school have got no expression, as it were. ”

“ Constant immigrations took place which were continually leading them to every point in Western Europe, but none of them ever brought anything novel in art beyond what their predecessors had already introduced. ”

“ Cable, too, you should read, and Henry James and Miss Jewett; they're all of this modern school, that most Western people know nothing about. The West is so afraid of its own judgments. My 166 friends go about praising the classics because they know it's safe to do so, I suppose, while I am an image breaker to them. Mr. Howells says the idea of progress in art does not admit of the conception that any art is finished. ”

“ The delicate perfection of workmanship, the light strength and grace of objects, the power manifest to obtain the best results with the least material, the achieving of mechanical ends by the simplest possible means, the comprehension of irregularity as aesthetic value, the shapeliness and perfect taste of everything, the sense displayed of harmony in tints or colours,—all this must convince you at once that our Occident has much to learn from this remote civilization, not only in matters of art and taste, but in matters likewise of [9] economy and utility. ”

“ That a great nation should deliberately discourage the importation of beautiful things, should wallow in the mire of ugliness and refuse to be cleansed by art, was to him a mystery,—for what difference does it make whether painting, poetry, and music come out of the East or out of the West, so long as they add to the happiness of a people? And why should painting and sculpture find the gate closed when poetry and music are admitted? ”

“ Our arts have undertaken an enormous accession of truths and ambitions upon which the arts of the extreme East have never ventured. They have attained their end, the end of all art, at an earlier mental period. ”

“ Literature in the West, up to the present time, has been sporadic, and, viewed largely, it has been negligible. Bret Harte and Joaquin Miller have left their impress on their time, but, aside from these, there is no one of whom the world has taken cognizance. But the West is spoken of and thought of as a cradle of art. Here the conditions of climate, the beauty of the earth, the freedom and vigor of living, unworn traditions, and the stimulus of a growing civilization are all hospitable to creative work and to the nourishment of the imagination. ”

“ And it began to see that this Perfection, cosmically, was nothing but perfect Equanimity and Harmony; and in human relations, nothing but perfect Love and Justice. And Perfection began to glow before the eyes of the Western world like a new star, whose light touched with glamour all things as they came forth from Mystery, till to Mystery they were ready to return.
This—I thought is surely what the Western world has dimly been rediscovering. There has crept into our minds once more the feeling that the Universe is all of a piece, Equipoise supreme; ”

“ The most evident proof of this triumph of American progress is the decadence or disappearance of all the schools of art. Europe was in past centuries, in harder and more difficult times than the present, the glorious mother and mistress of civilisation, because under diverse forms, she managed to create and keep going schools of literature, sculpture, painting, architecture, and music. ”

“ Every thing by which a people can outwardly show what is within—literature, art, and architecture, displays the influence of the East. The literature learned, artificial, florid, but deficient in elegance and grace, and without a spark of genius to illumine it. ”

“ Wherever we find in European history a revival of decorative art, it has, I fancy, nearly always been due to Oriental influence and contact with Oriental nations. Our own keenly intellectual art has more than once been ready to sacrifice real decorative beauty either to imitative presentation or to ideal motive. It has taken upon itself the burden of expression, and has sought to interpret the secrets of thought and passion. In its marvellous truth of presentation it has found its strength, and yet its weakness is there also. It is never with impunity that an art seeks to mirror life. ”

“ When, from the busy scene of European revival and progress, of which we have remarked a few features, we turn our view to the nations of the East, how strikingly contrasted is the prospect! Instead of the turmoil of change, the hurry after new inventions, the disuse of old customs and processes, we see the life of art to be one steady, even tenor. ”

“ Hence the general conclusion seems evident, that in Britain, the art, as compared with itself, has continued to improve.
Compared with foreign art, the distinctive character of the English school is strongly marked. Painting on the [Pg 224] Continent exhibits a striking uniformity of style, with such peculiarities as, on a general view, will not lessen the truth of a common classification. The Continental artist, then, studies to detail, but fails in power of general effect; his performances are more valuable as works of art and of imitation, than of imagination or abstract resemblance. ”

“ With any advance in the arts of social life, we have a corresponding advance in artistic skill and taste, rising very high in the art of Japan and India, but culminating in the marvellous sculpture of the best period of Grecian history. ”

“ As regards English art it is certain that, partly from the influence of foreign queens, partly from foreign wars, and partly from the incessant intercourse with the rest of Europe kept up by religious houses, many of the accomplishments of other countries were known and practised here by foreign or native artists. ”

“ Such we find to have been the case in the rise of the fine arts in this country, which up to this time have been rather an echo of the art of the lands from which our ancestors came, than distinctively original. ”

“ As Europe loosed its hold upon the earlier arts of Greece and Rome, was dismembered, and was for centuries plunged in darkness by the incursions and dispersal of barbarians, and then, as it revived, developed a new artistic sense and greater strength, so America passed through a precisely similar ordeal.
Two thousand years ago—possibly many more—art and civilization existed here, and continued to expand until Europeans came and checked their farther growth. America is not even singular in this, that a broad chasm divides the old from the new. ”

“ But our artists are those whose expatriation gives us most to think about. They take leave of us either in the first bloom or in the full maturity of their powers. The ease of living in Southern Europe, the abundance of models and of works of art, the picturesque charms of nature and of scenery, detain them forever from us, and, save for an abstract sentiment, which itself weakens with every year, the sacred tie of country is severed. ”

“ But there is, I suppose, a very general impression on the mind of persons interested in the arts, that because nations living in cold climates are necessarily unfamiliar with the sight of the naked body, therefore, art should take it upon herself to show it them; and that they will be elevated in thought, and made more simple and grave in temper, by seeing, at least in colour and marble, what the people of the south saw in its verity. ”

“ It is in America that we are to have the great Art of Arts—that whose task is to utilize the Arts of other lands and ages as pigments, to be combined into new proportions for unprecedented effects, and to invest fairer ideals. ”

“ In revolution from such artificial and untrue methods, influenced greatly by West, artists began painting things as they saw them, painting slavishly from nature, every leaf and stone, and such work merited the term realism. ”

“ When the condition of Europe and its religious thought are clearly 116understood, it is not difficult to imagine the reception that greeted the first dawn of modern realistic art. Sculpture and painting deified the material. ”

“ Instead of doing so, they tried to imitate the native wares, and, which was far worse, commissioned the native artists to adopt European styles and to attempt to gratify the whims of European taste and fashion. We cannot wonder that art declined, but are rather led to be surprised that the decline was not more speedy and permanent. ”

“ If one cannot afford expensive paintings to hang on her walls, she can select photographs of the old masters, neatly framed, which, placed in harmonious surroundings, elevate the mind, cause a love of the beautiful, develop the taste, and lay the foundation for a broad culture that will increase the enjoyment of nature as well as of art. ”