Model (design)

“ The direction of line used in relieving forms, and expressing modelling and details, must depend much upon individual taste and feeling as well as knowledge of form. The element of beauty of design also comes in, and the question between this and force or literalness—the difference between a study or direct transcript from nature, and a design with a purely ornamental aim, or a composition directed mainly to the expression of a particular idea or emotion. ”

“ The quality of the surface left by the skilled artist or artisan is more regarded than symmetry of design, or even than correct modelling. Frequently only the important parts in a design are carefully finished and the rest merely sketched: the mode of working, whether by modelling-tools or hammer, being always left apparent. ”

“ PASTEBOARD MODELS FOR A HOME DRAWING
CLASS
Study drawing at home and make your own models; form a class of several girls and work together; criticise one another’s drawings, and get a criticism from an artist whenever you can. Much may be accomplished in this way if you have the enthusiasm, perseverance, and will to carry it through. Starting with one object, complete in itself, a variety of forms may be evolved, and combinations can be made until an entirely new model is produced. ”

“ In the primitive ornament of all peoples we find the same or similar typical forms constantly recurring, the germs of pattern design afterwards developed, complicated, and refined upon: the chequer, the zigzag, the fret, the circle, the spiral volute, the twisting scroll—can we ascribe their invention to any individual mind or hand? Can the mechanician tell us who were the inventors of the wheel, the lever, the mode of producing fire, the canoe, the paddle, the spade, the plough, the vessel of clay, the axe, the hammer, the needle, or even spinning and weaving? ”

“ For instance, in silhouette, profile renderings only are intelligible, and in delicate bas-relief modelling any foreshortening should be avoided if confusing to the effect.
In direct personal work, such as drawing or painting, when craft conditions other than that of the medium employed are not involved, convention is purely a matter of discretion and consideration of the nature and object of the work; but it is essential in design when the material and method of production have to be considered. ”

“ Hence, when our great artists required an ideal of beauty in painting or in sculpture, they would take several models, each supplying some beautiful detail not to be found in the rest,—one model furnishing the features, another the general outline, each a separate limb. ”

“ Modelling differs from drawing and painting in that every side of the model is visible, while only the face of the painting is presented to the eye, where the impression of form and outline is worked out on a flat surface. ”

“ These four qualities—emphasis, unity, balance, and rhythm—are necessary in what might be called the mechanics of beauty, the technique of design. We admit, cheerfully, that the beauty of a given masterpiece cannot be explained by pointing out an observance of certain fundamental laws of design, for an uninspired artist might obey all these laws without ever achieving beauty, just as a machinist might obey all the laws of mechanics without ever inventing a machine. ”

“ Look round the world—observe its order—its regularity—its design. Something must have created it—the design speaks a designer: in that certainty we first touch land. But what is that something?—A god, you cry. ”

“ In all these imitative processes the question of design becomes of the very highest importance, since the material has neither beauty nor intrinsic value in itself; and here, even more than in many other forms of manufacture, the presence and influence of the intelligent designer is most desirable, and should be paramount. ”

“ Now that we have schools of design, and more accessible specimens of art, the direction is given without the aids—“Make a new pattern,” and the artist sits down with nothing before him but pencil and paper—unless, indeed, he finds aids for himself in wild flowers, and other such instructors in beauty of form and color. By degrees, the different parts of the pattern shape themselves out, and combine—the centre groups with the ends, and the ends grow out into the sides with a natural and graceful transition. ”

“ And for our work to gain the same sensibility, the same range of appeal, the same human interest, we must employ the same means. We must clothe modern ideas in modern dress; adorn our design with living fancy, and rise to the height of our knowledge and capacities.
Doubtless there is danger to the untrained designer in direct resort to Nature. For the tendency in his or her case is to copy outright, to give us pure crude fact and not to design at all. ”

“ As regards procedure in working out a design, one generally thinks of some leading feature, some central mass or form or curve—of a figure or a flower, say—and one thinks of its capacity in repeat; and, since one form or line should inevitably suggest or necessitate—as by a kind of logic—another, one adds other forms until the design is complete. For it must never be forgotten that design is a growth which has its own stages of evolution in the mind, answering to the evolution of the living forms of nature—first the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear. ”

“ When the chosen model rightly inspired him—and without that model his invention was often vapid and inert—he could succeed in a degree which no other artist has matched or surpassed in registering not only the permanent facts of beauty in form and feature, but in arresting with equal felicity the most fleeting moments of tender or passionate expression. ”

“ From the water-colour sketch in the possession of Miss Violet Dickinson.
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In the matter of models, whether for illustrations or exhibition drawings, she was particular and fastidious. At all times she preferred to draw from the life. Her studies from the nude—made in her youth, with such conscientious accuracy that every form, every fold in the skin, and every undulation of high light and shadow, were rendered with the firmness and with ease that come of practice, knowledge, and skill—had carried her far enough for the model to be reckoned a servant, and not a master. ”

“ With them it is difficult to obtain that intermingling of colours, be they bright or dull, that produces a neutral bloom and a satisfactory result. Another important point in a pattern, and often overlooked, or not understood, is that, unless the pattern, as a whole, is satisfactory, no variety or beauty of detail can make it a good design. The general character or lines of the pattern must first be made satisfactory, after which the detail may be made as interesting as possible, provided it does not injure the general effect, and is not incongruous to the nature of the design. ”

“ Nothing could be simpler. First you get your model;—she’s most probably stood for hundreds of other men, and knows more about the business than you do yourself; your master tells you how to pose her; you put her in a cabbage-patch or kitchen prepared for the purpose, like those in Chailly, for example; paint the background as carefully as you know how, and your picture’s made. It’s easier to learn how to paint than to find motives for yourself; so follow as closely as possible in other men’s steps ”

“ Never try to place a model in a pose which he can only hold by an unnatural strain. You will not get a satisfactory result from it. Study your model; see what poses he most naturally falls into, and then take advantage of one of these, and arrange your picture with reference to it.
Never attempt to represent a character in your picture by using a model of a different class or type from it; you will not be successful either in painting a lady from a model who is a peasant, nor in painting a peasant from a model who is a lady. ”

“ Given a certain outline and certain tones, measures, and shapes to be put into it, it is the Problem of Pure Design to do the best we can, getting as many connections making unity as possible. The process is one of experimenting, observing, comparing, judging, arranging and rearranging, taking no end of time and pains to achieve Order, the utmost possible Order, if possible the Beautiful. ”

“ The conditions which govern the making of a sketch or study upon paper are sufficient as tests of artistic capacity, of draughtsmanship, of taste, and the other fine qualities which go to the making of a work of art, having what may be termed an independent or individual interest and value; but in adapting any kind of design to a definite ornamental purpose other conditions immediately come into play over and above those belonging to the conditions of draughtsmanship alone, conditions which at once influence the style of draughtsmanship and determine the treatment. ”

“ Following this thought of the oneness of art, we find that the picture, the plan, and the pattern are alike in the sense that each is a group of synthetically related spaces. Abstract design is, as it were, the primer of painting, in which principles of Composition appear in a clear and definite form. In the picture they are not so obvious, being found in complex interrelations and concealed under detail. ”

“ From the earliest known experiences, the implicit aesthetic component is the optimizing element of the experience. This aesthetic component extends perceived formal qualities found in nature to the aesthetics of objects and activities in the realm of human nature. The language of design expresses awareness of these formal characteristics. Practical experiences display a repetitive pattern: the optimal choice (of shapes, colors, rhythms, sounds, movement) is always pleasing. ”

“ So vastly is the demand for wood-engravings every day growing, that nothing is more difficult than to obtain designs, or when obtained to get them cut. Ladies, therefore, who have a genius for design, would soon find their value amongst the publishers; and while the profession of a designer is both elegant and feminine, how much more independent, and much less laborious, it would be than needlework, or the duties and position of a governess. ”

“ But whereas the pictorial artist or picture painter carries his own work through to completion, is designer and craftsman in one; in short, the designer for some industrial purpose, unless he is his own craftsman, must make his design also a working drawing to conform to certain strict technical conditions, such as the nature of the material and the method of reproduction, certain limits of size and number of colours to be used and so forth. ”

“ There is no merit in the mere multiplication of features. It is a mistake. The rule of Pure Design, and it is the rule for all Design, is simplification rather than complication. As designers we ought to avoid additions, if possible. ”

“ The ingenuity in designing such patterns as those below and opposite, which is very considerable, consists in so scheming them that every lead line shall fulfil alike a constructive and an artistic function; that is to say, that every line in the design shall be necessary to its artistic effect, that there shall be no lead line which is not an outline, no outline which is not a lead. ”

“ Every form in a work of art has, then, to be made aesthetically significant; also every form has to be made a part of a significant whole. For, as generally happens, the value of the parts combined into a whole is far greater than the value of the sum of the parts. This organisation of forms into a significant whole is called Design; and an insistence—an exaggerated insistence some will say—on design is the fourth characteristic of the Contemporary Movement. ”

“ When we have settled upon our quality of line and its degree—thick or thin, bold or fine—we shall be met with the question of emphasis, for upon this the ultimate effect and expression of our [55] drawing or design must largely depend. In the selection of any subject we should naturally be influenced by the attractiveness of particular parts, characters, or qualities it might possess, and we should direct our efforts towards bringing these out, as the things which impress us most. ”

“ The following addresses, though spoken at different times, are intentionally connected in subject; their aim being to set one or two main principles of art in simple light before the general student, and to indicate their practical bearing on modern design. The law which it has been my effort chiefly to illustrate is the dependence of all noble design, in any kind, on the sculpture or painting of Organic Form. ”

“ The object of the designer need not be to render a direct imitation of nature; but there is no reason why a textile designer should not use the power at his disposal of suggesting the surface appearance, or the beauties, or characteristics of the object which forms the subject of the design. ”

“ After you have taken a figure, or any idea of a figure, from any of those great Painters, there is another operation still remaining, which I hold to be indispensably necessary—that is, never to neglect finishing from nature every part of the work. What is taken from a model, though the first idea may have been suggested by another, you have a just right to consider as your own property. ”

“ You may find a picture or model that would make a good subject for a novelty window of certain kinds of goods, and it could be worked out in fine style if only sufficient time were given for detail work, that is, making all of the different parts of the subject in their proper place, and leaving out of the work not the slightest detail necessary to make the finished work identically like the picture or model. ”

“ The design, your Lordship sees, is good, the colouring transparent,—the drawing not amiss;—or to speak more like a man of science,—and measure my piece in the painter's scale, divided into 20,—I believe, my Lord, the out-lines will turn out as 12,— the composition as 9,—the colouring as 6,—the expression 13 and a half,— and the design,—if I may be allowed, my Lord, to understand my own design, and supposing absolute perfection in designing, to be as 20,—I think it cannot well fall short of 19. ”