Decorative art

“ It is the principle or requirement, of geometric base in interior design which, coupled with our natural delight in yielding or growing forms, has maintained through all the long history of decoration what is called conventionalised flower design. We find this in every form or method of decorative art, from embroidery to sculpture, from the Lotus of Egypt to the Rose of England, and although it results in a sort of crucifixion of the natural beauty of the flower, in the hands of great designers it has become an authoritative style of art. ”

“ The power of the artist’s effects, the wonderful facility of his execution, the beauty of the colouring and delicacy of drawing, all combine to give what may pass for a marvellous transcript of nature, but taken separately and examined critically, the objects depicted, be they bird, flower, leaf, or insect, will be found incorrect in form, proportion, and construction, if judged by a European standard. Yet in these very failings are found their highest merits as decorative artists. Decorative art does not admit of absolute fidelity to nature ”

“ Purely æsthetic decorative art has had its origin in the attempt to please the eye by lines and colors, just as music has originated in the attempt to give pleasure to the ear by a rhythmic series of sounds. Imitative decorative art appeals to the understanding as well as to the feelings: it is a song with words, but mere aesthetic ornament is visible music without words, and it is to this latter division of ornament that I shall principally invite your attention. ”

“ for I wish rather, in this lecture at least, to dwell on the effect that decorative art has on human life—on its social not its purely artistic effect. ”

“ And all the greatest art which the world has produced is thus fitted for a place, and subordinated to a purpose. There is no existing highest-order art but is decorative. The best sculpture yet produced has been the decoration of a temple front—the best painting, the decoration of a room. ”

“ It is verily surprising what an important element ornament is in life. Is it, then, wonderful that man, striving everywhere to please the same eye by lines, should occasionally invent, independently, similar ornamental forms, or that decorative art should, in its beginning, evolve in the same direction in different countries? ”

“ The decorative designer certainly depends largely for freshness of inspiration and suggestion in design and colour upon growing plants and flowers, upon the sight of birds and animals, of the ever-changing sea and sky, and the colours of the landscape. If the sense from which is produced the very elements of decoration thus requires to be kept alive and in health, surely the sense which appreciates the product, which selects and uses, needs also similar access to nature to preserve a healthy tone. ”

“ And thus arise the various forms of inferior decorative art, respecting which the general law is, that the lower the place and office of the thing, the less of natural or perfect form you should have in it; a zigzag or a chequer is thus a better, because a more consistent ornament for a cup or platter than a landscape or portrait is: hence the general definition of the true forms of conventional ornament is, that they consist in the bestowal of as much beauty on the object as shall be consistent with its Material, its Place, and its Office. ”

“ With these people, the highest class of decoration consisted of designs in color. This topic is fully discussed in a subsequent section.
Origin of ornament.—It is probable that before pottery came into use the decorative art had been cultivated in other fields, and we shall need to look both to nature and to antecedent arts for the originals of many decorative ideas.
From a remote period man has been able to appreciate beauty. ”

“ Every age, too, has its own notions of decoration—indeed one might say even every decade now, or even a less period, we live so fast! No rules or canons of taste in art are of universal application or acceptable to all periods. As decoration is primarily fitness and harmony, with this central idea one may produce decorative effects with very different materials, and we have only to glance back to our historic periods to see how it was accomplished. ”

“ A rule to be respected is that decoration should be reposing instead of exciting. The unexpected, which is an element in the enjoyment of what is new, should be such as to become the more agreeable the longer we are accustomed to it. Mr. Morris’s golden rule is this: “Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful.” [471] In decorative art, and therefore in embroidery, the first object to consider is beauty—beauty in conception, proportion, drawing, and colour. ”

“ The result is, therefore, that the decorative art of any period is an indication of that which gives pleasure at the moment, and an absolute reflex of the artistic wishes, desires, and tastes of the cultivated classes to whom executive art must appeal. ”

“ When painted walls were in fashion, there existed, below the great creative artists, schools of decorative designers skilled in the art of fresco-decoration, from the simplest kind to the most ornate. ”

“ Some of the designs are wonderfully good, bold, simple, and unique, whilst the coloured patterns often testify a richness of fancy and comprehension of decorative art, quite astonishing in artists so untaught. ”

“ The principle, too, of counterchange in heraldry answers to our principle of relief by contrast, and though its chief charm lies in its ornamental range of form and colour combinations, it can be expressed in black and white, and it remains a universal principle throughout decorative art. The decorative effect and charm of the relief of large and bold forms upon rich and delicate diapers is also an important resource of the designer. The monumental art of the Middle Ages affords multitudes of examples of this principle in ornamental treatment. ”

“ At every period it has been found that this taste is constantly changing, and as a consequence the examples of decorative art of any period are a reflex only of the artistic ideas current at the time the work was done. ”

“ Decoration, as in architectural sculpture and in patterns for carpets and wall-coverings, often draws its motives from nature, such as leaves, flowers, fruits, and animals; but when the function of the work is decorative and not representative, the naturalistic and graphic character of the subject is subordinated to the purposes of abstract and formal design. A picture, on the other hand, which is frankly representative in purpose, must submit its composition and color-harmony to the requirements of unity in design; in a sense it must make a pattern. ”

“ Brief as the review has necessarily been of the decorative arts adorning life throughout the centuries which have passed in rapid succession before us, they have taught two great facts—the beauty of art as an adjunct to the most ordinary demands of domesticity, and the value of the study of the varied arts of past ages as an addition to the requirements of our own. ”

“ To a certain extent, indeed, all good painting has the decorative character of monumental art. That is to say, a basis of harmonious design underlies all other qualities in the works of great painters. Mere life-like figure painting is not, in the best sense, art at all. But so long as the idea of beautiful design governs, all the qualities required for the representation of nature may be carried very far, with good effect, even in decorative wall painting. ”

“ Nature to the decorative mind presents a variegated pattern from which to clip any shape which the color design demands.
The influence on pictorial art of the decorative tendency, has brought much into the pictorial category which has never been classified.
The Rose Croix influence has witnessed its seed maturing into the art nouveau, and what was nurtured under the forcing glass of decoration has suddenly been transplanted into the garden of pictorial art. ”

“ In color, as in relieved design, each species of constructive combination gives rise to more or less distinct groups of decorative results, which often become the distinguishing characteristics of the work of different peoples and the progenitors of long lines of distinctions in national decorative conceptions. ”

“ Decoration with primitive and pre-historic man may be considered chiefly personal and possible. The taste for decorative pattern was gratified upon his own skin in the form of tattoo or war-paint, or in strings of beads, feather head-dresses, and the carved handles of his weapons. Not that modern man—still less modern woman—has given up personal decoration, in fact, I suppose feathers and beads were never so much in demand, but it seems that modern painters and decorators having provided so much more elaborate and becoming backgrounds they have to be “lived up to.” ”

“ They are all “trimmings,” in the sense of being decorative edges to more solid materials. They are not available as coverings for warmth or decency; but they serve to give the grace of mystery to the object they drape or veil. They soften the outlines and the colours beneath them, while they permit them to peep through their meshes. They are hardly to be included in what is called high art, having more affinity with grace, refinement and coquetry, than with æsthetic culture or noble thought. ”

“ To some extent even painting, especially in its decorative branches, may be considered as a means of exhortation. The various decorations of the body which are usually adopted for fighting no doubt raise the courage of their wearers. ”

“ Often the relationship hangs on similarity in period, style of painting or colour scheme. Your expert will see decorative value in a painting which has no individual beauty nor intrinsic worth when taken out of a particular setting. ”

“ A long heritage of decorative folk art, expressed in wood carving, embroidery, weaving, pottery, and other forms, has been important as artistic expression for the peasants and has served as inspiration for the more sophisticated painters, sculptors, and architects. ”

“ One of their characteristics is that the decorations are largely functional, the object in the maker’s mind evidently having been to provide a firm grip for the operator and at the same time to produce a decorative effect. ”

“ These Artists having for many years been deeply attached to the study of the Decorative Arts of all times and countries, have felt more than most people the want of some one place, where they could either obtain or get produced work of a genuine and beautiful character. ”

“ The brilliance of the mural paintings and richly coloured sculpture and mouldings was in harmony with the splendour of the oak-work—screens, stalls, and roofs—all decorated with gilding and painting, while the light, passing through stained glass, softened and helped to combine the whole into one mass of decorative effect. Colour was boldly applied everywhere, and thus the patchy effect was avoided which is so often the result of the modern timid and partial use of painted ornament. ”

“ As the stem and branches to the leaves, flowers, and fruit of a tree, so is design to painting. In decoration one cannot exist without the other, as the beauty of a figure depends upon the well-built and well-proportioned skeleton and its mechanism. You cannot separate a house from its plan and foundations. So it is in decoration; often thought of lightly as something trivial and superficial, a merely aimless combination of curves and colours, or a mere réchauffé of the dead languages of art, but really demanding the best thought and capacity of a man ”

“ Let us suppose that a piece of pottery or porcelain has been painted, and that the action of the fire has made the coloring perennial, so that we find on it a portrait or a landscape everlasting as the ware itself. Let us suppose, further, that the tints are natural, that, in short, the portrait is all that we now understand by the word, and that in the landscape nature is displayed as on canvas—then we should have a specimen of the perfect union of the potter’s and painter’s art. ”

“ Decoration in color, in the shape of hieroglyphic inscriptions and paintings of all sorts, was profusely employed, and is executed with a truth of drawing and a beauty of coloring that have never been surpassed. Almost every object drawn is partly conventionalized, in the most skillful manner, so as to make it fit its place as a piece of a decorative system. ”

“ Decoration In Painting. Sibyls, Muses, and Virtues. Roman Ideas Absorbed from the Greek. Concerning the Birth of Genius. Frescoes by Raphael. Ideal Woman In Modern Decoration.
To whatever age, tribe, or country we look for the beginnings of art, we find symbolic decorations. It has been practiced by all peoples in response to universal instinct. Decoration needs a motif, a subject or figure singly or in repetition, be it to grace the family soup bowl of the aborigine, or to add a fearsome and compelling expression to his copper countenance. ”

“ Is not the flower the queen of ornaments, the inspiration of all races and ages, the very soul of artistic decoration? Have not the hands of genius contrived to employ the most durable as well as the most fragile material to express this delicate beauty in Greek and Gothic capitals, in the stone lacework of cathedrals, the fabrics of gold and silk, brocades, tapestries, wrought iron-work, old bindings? Is the splendor of stained-glass windows aught else than the splendor of a mass of beautiful flowers? ”

“ An added charm is given alike to the interior and exterior by the combined richness and quaintness of the decorative sculpture, in which is clearly illustrated the delight in symbolism of the mediæval craftsmen, who, working in close accord with architect and builder, supplemented effigies of heroes and heroines of the faith, royal patrons, &c., with emblematic animals, fruit, flowers, and foliage, welding the most incongruous forms into an elaborate and beautiful scheme of ornamentation. ”