antagonism between what is decorative and what is scenic in painting than is sometimes supposed.[1]
The essential elements of decorative effect and of pictorial truth are to some extent even dependent the one upon the other. For instance, the preservation of local hues throughout the great masses of a design, by the avoidance of neutral shading, which truth to nature demands, secures at the same time the full decorative value of every colour field. The mediæval Italian always preserved his local hues, both from a habit of pictorial veracity, and from a true decorative instinct. Hence the wall painting of Italy in the Middle Ages was as decorative and monumental in character as that of the Northern Gothic, while it became much more developed and beautiful as painting.
From the time of Cimabue to the time of Botticelli, the decorative idea ruled everything else in pictorial design. The constant habit of painting on walls gave something of a monumental character to even small panel pictures, and to this is largely due their essential beauty. To a certain extent, indeed, all good painting has the decorative character of monumental art. That is to say, a basis of harmonious
- ↑ I think that M. Viollet-le-Duc, in his article Peinture, errs greatly in maintaining that the principles of pictorial and of decorative art are opposed the one to the other. I do not find that any such antagonism has apparently been felt to exist between them in the minds of the greatest painters of the past, whose art has been at once decorative and pictorial in purpose.
M. Viollet-le-Duc, on p. 61 of his article, refers to the arts of the Egyptians and Persians as illustrating the true principles of decorative art, and to the works of painters like Titian and Rembrandt, as illustrating those of pictorial art. But the author fails to recognise the fact that the art of Titian, like that of every great colourist, is in certain fundamental principles of design allied very closely to the more purely decorative arts of Egypt and Persia. The more commonly appreciated pictorial qualities of Titian's painting constitute but a small part of his art, which is strictly based upon principles of colour relations similar to those which give charm to the work of the Persian weaver. The author's objection to all pictorial treatment on the ground that the perspective which it involves calls for a single point of view, and is not only not architecturally effective, but is even injurious to architectural effect, is, I think, urged too strongly. The eye naturally makes large allowance in this regard. Very rarely are any pictures viewed from the precise point for which their perspectives are calculated; but if only the broad colour masses are fine and well disposed, a picture will always be broadly effective in its decorative qualities, however it may be viewed.
How far, in painting, natural modelling, chiaroscuro, and perspective are compatible with the best architectural effectiveness I do not attempt to determine. But certainly the line between what is decorative on the one hand, and what is pictorial on the other, cannot properly be so sharply drawn as it is by M. Viollet-le-Duc.
