{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_16917/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_16917","id":"gutenberg_16917","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/16917","summary":null,"tags":["Aesthetics","Art","Art -- History","Category: Art","Category: Philosophy & Ethics"],"text":"E-text prepared by Suzanne Shell, Janet Blenkinship, and the Project\nGutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team (https://www.pgdp.net/)\n\n\n\nNote: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this\n      file which includes the original illustrations.\n      See 16917-h.htm or 16917-h.zip:\n      (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/6/9/1/16917/16917-h/16917-h.htm)\n      or\n      (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/6/9/1/16917/16917-h.zip)\n\n\n\n\n\nART\n\nby\n\nCLIVE BELL\n\n1913\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration: WEI FIGURE, FIFTH CENTURY\n_In M. Vignier's Collection_]\n\n\n\n\nNew York\nFrederick A. Stokes Company\nPublishers\n\nPrinted in Great Britain\n\nAll rights reserved\n\n\n\n\n\nPREFACE\n\n\nIn this little book I have tried to develop a complete theory of visual\nart. I have put forward an hypothesis by reference to which the\nrespectability, though not the validity, of all aesthetic judgments can\nbe tested, in the light of which the history of art from palaeolithic\ndays to the present becomes intelligible, by adopting which we give\nintellectual backing to an almost universal and immemorial conviction.\nEveryone in his heart believes that there is a real distinction between\nworks of art and all other objects; this belief my hypothesis justifies.\nWe all feel that art is immensely important; my hypothesis affords\nreason for thinking it so. In fact, the great merit of this hypothesis\nof mine is that it seems to explain what we know to be true. Anyone who\nis curious to discover why we call a Persian carpet or a fresco by Piero\ndella Francesca a work of art, and a portrait-bust of Hadrian or a\npopular problem-picture rubbish, will here find satisfaction. He will\nfind, too, that to the familiar counters of criticism--_e.g._ \"good\ndrawing,\" \"magnificent design,\" \"mechanical,\" \"unfelt,\" \"ill-organised,\"\n\"sensitive,\"--is given, what such terms sometimes lack, a definite\nmeaning. In a word, my hypothesis works; that is unusual: to some it has\nseemed not only workable but true; that is miraculous almost.\n\nIn fifty or sixty thousand words, though one may develop a theory\nadequately, one cannot pretend to develop it exhaustively. My book is a\nsimplification. I have tried to make a generalisation about the nature\nof art that shall be at once true, coherent, and comprehensible. I have\nsought a theory which should explain the whole of my aesthetic\nexperience and suggest a solution of every problem, but I have not\nattempted to answer in detail all the questions that proposed\nthemselves, or to follow any one of them along its slenderest\nramifications. The science of aesthetics is a complex business and so is\nthe history of art; my hope has been to write about them something\nsimple and true. For instance, though I have indicated very clearly, and\neven repetitiously, what I take to be essential in a work of art, I\nhave not discussed as fully as I might have done the relation of the\nessential to the unessential. There is a great deal more to be said\nabout the mind of the artist and the nature of the artistic problem. It\nremains for someone who is an artist, a psychologist, and an expert in\nhuman limitations to tell us how far the unessential is a necessary\nmeans to the essential--to tell us whether it is easy or difficult or\nimpossible for the artist to destroy every rung in the ladder by which\nhe has climbed to the stars.\n\nMy first chapter epitomises discussions and conversations and long\nstrands of cloudy speculation which, condensed to solid argument, would\nstill fill two or three stout volumes: some day, perhaps, I shall write\none of them if my critics are rash enough to provoke me. As for my third\nchapter--a sketch of the history of fourteen hundred years--that it is a\nsimplification goes without saying. Here I have used a series of\nhistorical generalisations to illustrate my theory; and here, again, I\nbelieve in my theory, and am persuaded that anyone who will consider the\nhistory of art in its light will find that history more intelligible\nthan of old. At the same time I willingly admit that in fact the\ncontrasts are less violent, the hills less precipitous, than they must\nbe made to appear in a chart of this sort. Doubtless it would be well if\nthis chapter also were expanded into half a dozen readable volumes, but\nthat it cannot be until the learned authorities have learnt to write or\nsome writer has learnt to be patient.\n\nThose conversations and discussions that have tempered and burnished the\ntheories advanced in my first chapter have been carried on for the most\npart with Mr. Roger Fry, to whom, therefore, I owe a debt that defies\nexact computation. In the first place, I can thank him, as joint-editor\nof _The Burlington Magazine_, for permission to reprint some part of an\nessay contributed by me to that periodical. That obligation discharged,\nI come to a more complicated reckoning. The first time I met Mr. Fry, in\na railway carriage plying between Cambridge and London, we fell into\ntalk about contemporary art and its relation to all other art; it seems\nto me sometimes that we have been talking about the same thing ever\nsince, but my friends assure me that it is not quite so bad as that. Mr.\nFry, I remember, had recently become familiar with the modern French\nmasters--Cezanne, Gauguin, Matisse: I enjoyed the advantage of a longer\nacquaintance. Already, however, Mr. Fry had published his _Essay in\nAesthetics_, which, to my thinking, was the most helpful contribution to\nthe science that had been made since the days of Kant. We talked a good\ndeal about that essay, and then we discussed the possibility of a\n\"Post-Impressionist\" Exhibition at the Grafton Galleries. We did not\ncall it \"Post-Impressionist\"; the word was invented later by Mr. Fry,\nwhich makes me think it a little hard that the more advanced critics\nshould so often upbraid him for not knowing what \"Post-Impressionism\"\nmeans.\n\nFor some years Mr. Fry and I have been arguing, more or less amicably,\nabout the principles of aesthetics. We still disagree profoundly. I like\nto think that I have not moved an inch from my original position, but I\nmust confess that the cautious doubts and reservations that have\ninsinuated themselves into this Preface are all indirect consequences of\nmy friend's criticism. And it is not only of general ideas and\nfundamental things that we have talked; Mr. Fry and I have wrangled for\nhours about particular works of art. In such cases the extent to which\none may have affected the judgment of the other cannot possibly be\nappraised, nor need it be: neither of us, I think, covets the doubtful\nhonours of proselytism. Surely whoever appreciates a fine work of art\nmay be allowed the exquisite pleasure of supposing that he has made a\ndiscovery? Nevertheless, since all artistic theories are based on\naesthetic judgments, it is clear that should one affect the judgments of\nanother, he may affect, indirectly, some of his theories; and it is\ncertain that some of my historical generalisations have been modified,\nand even demolished, by Mr. Fry. His task was not arduous: he had merely\nto confront me with some work over which he was sure that I should go\ninto ecstasies, and then to prove by the most odious and irrefragable\nevidence that it belonged to a period which I had concluded, on the\nhighest _a priori_ grounds, to be utterly barren. I can only hope that\nMr. Fry's scholarship has been as profitable to me as it has been\npainful: I have travelled with him through France, Italy, and the near\nEast, suffering acutely, not always, I am glad to remember, in silence;\nfor the man who stabs a generalisation with a fact forfeits all claim on\ngood-fellowship and the usages of polite society.\n\nI have to thank my friend Mr. Vernon Rendall for permission to make what\nuse I chose of the articles I have contributed from time to time to\n_The Athenaeum_: if I have made any use of what belongs by law to the\nproprietors of other papers I herewith offer the customary dues. My\nreaders will be as grateful as I to M. Vignier, M. Druet, and Mr.\nKevorkian, of the Persian Art Gallery, since it is they who have made it\ncertain that the purchaser will get something he likes for his money. To\nMr. Eric Maclagan of South Kensington, and Mr. Joyce of the British\nMuseum, I owe a more private and particular debt. My wife has been good\nenough to read both the MS. and proof of this book; she has corrected\nsome errors, and called attention to the more glaring offences against\nChristian charity. You must not attempt, therefore, to excuse the author\non the ground of inadvertence or haste.\n\n  CLIVE BELL.\n  November 1913.\n\n\n\n\n                CONTENTS\n\n\n             I. WHAT IS ART?\n\n    I. THE AESTHETIC HYPOTHESIS             page 3\n\n   II. AESTHETICS AND POST-IMPRESSIONISM        38\n\n  III. THE METAPHYSICAL HYPOTHESIS              49\n\n\n            II. ART AND LIFE\n\n    I. ART AND RELIGION                         75\n\n   II. ART AND HISTORY                          95\n\n  III. ART AND ETHICS                          106\n\n\n            III. THE CHRISTIAN SLOPE\n\n    I. THE RISE OF CHRISTIAN ART               121\n\n   II. GREATNESS AND DECLINE                   138\n\n  III. THE CLASSICAL RENAISSANCE AND ITS\n       DISEASES                                156\n\n   IV. ALID EX ALIO                            181\n\n\n            IV. THE MOVEMENT\n\n    I. THE DEBT TO CEZANNE                     199\n\n   II. SIMPLIFICATION AND DESIGN               215\n\n  III. THE PATHETIC FALLACY                    239\n\n\n            V. THE FUTURE\n\n    I. SOCIETY AND ART                         251\n\n   II. ART AND SOCIETY                         276\n\n\n\n\n                ILLUSTRATIONS\n\n\n    I. WEI FIGURE                          FRONTISPIECE\n\n   II. PERSIAN DISH                               3\n\n  III. PERUVIAN POT                              75\n\n   IV. BYZANTINE MOSAIC                         121\n\n    V. CEZANNE                                  199\n\n   VI. PICASSO                                  251\n\n\n\n\n                     I\n\n                WHAT IS ART?\n\n    I. THE AESTHETIC HYPOTHESIS\n\n   II. AESTHETICS AND POST-IMPRESSIONISM\n\n  III. THE METAPHYSICAL HYPOTHESIS\n\n\n  [Illustration: PERSIAN DISH, ELEVENTH CENTURY (?)\n  _By permission of Mr. Kevorkian of the Persian Art Gallery_]\n\n\n\n\nI\n\nTHE AESTHETIC HYPOTHESIS\n\n\nIt is improbable that more nonsense has been written about aesthetics\nthan about anything else: the literature of the subject is not large\nenough for that. It is certain, however, that about no subject with\nwhich I am acquainted has so little been said that is at all to the\npurpose. The explanation is discoverable. He who would elaborate a\nplausible theory of aesthetics must possess two qualities--artistic\nsensibility and a turn for clear thinking. Without sensibility a man can\nhave no aesthetic experience, and, obviously, theories not based on\nbroad and deep aesthetic experience are worthless. Only those for whom\nart is a constant source of passionate emotion can possess the data from\nwhich profitable theories may be deduced; but to deduce profitable\ntheories even from accurate data involves a certain amount of\nbrain-work, and, unfortunately, robust intellects and delicate\nsensibilities are not inseparable. As often as not, the hardest thinkers\nhave had no aesthetic experience whatever. I have a friend blessed with\nan intellect as keen as a drill, who, though he takes an interest in\naesthetics, has never during a life of almost forty years been guilty of\nan aesthetic emotion. So, having no faculty for distinguishing a work of\nart from a handsaw, he is apt to rear up a pyramid of irrefragable\nargument on the hypothesis that a handsaw is a work of art. This defect\nrobs his perspicuous and subtle reasoning of much of its value; for it\nhas ever been a maxim that faultless logic can win but little credit for\nconclusions that are based on premises notoriously false. Every cloud,\nhowever, has its silver lining, and this insensibility, though unlucky\nin that it makes my friend incapable of choosing a sound basis for his\nargument, mercifully blinds him to the absurdity of his conclusions\nwhile leaving him in full enjoyment of his masterly dialectic. People\nwho set out from the hypothesis that Sir Edwin Landseer was the finest\npainter that ever lived will feel no uneasiness about an aesthetic which\nproves that Giotto was the worst. So, my friend, when he arrives very\nlogically at the conclusion that a work of art should be small or round\nor smooth, or that to appreciate fully a picture you should pace smartly\nbefore it or set it spinning like a top, cannot guess why I ask him\nwhether he has lately been to Cambridge, a place he sometimes visits.\n\nOn the other hand, people who respond immediately and surely to works of\nart, though, in my judgment, more enviable than men of massive intellect\nbut slight sensibility, are often quite as incapable of talking sense\nabout aesthetics. Their heads are not always very clear. They possess\nthe data on which any system must be based; but, generally, they want\nthe power that draws correct inferences from true data. Having received\naesthetic emotions from works of art, they are in a position to seek out\nthe quality common to all that have moved them, but, in fact, they do\nnothing of the sort. I do not blame them. Why should they bother to\nexamine their feelings when for them to feel is enough? Why should they\nstop to think when they are not very good at thinking? Why should they\nhunt for a common quality in all objects that move them in a particular\nway when they can linger over the many delicious and peculiar charms of\neach as it comes? So, if they write criticism and call it aesthetics, if\nthey imagine that they are talking about Art when they are talking about\nparticular works of art or even about the technique of painting, if,\nloving particular works they find tedious the consideration of art in\ngeneral, perhaps they have chosen the better part. If they are not\ncurious about the nature of their emotion, nor about the quality common\nto all objects that provoke it, they have my sympathy, and, as what they\nsay is often charming and suggestive, my admiration too. Only let no one\nsuppose that what they write and talk is aesthetics; it is criticism, or\njust \"shop.\"\n\nThe starting-point for all systems of aesthetics must be the personal\nexperience of a peculiar emotion. The objects that provoke this emotion\nwe call works of art. All sensitive people agree that there is a\npeculiar emotion provoked by works of art. I do not mean, of course,\nthat all works provoke the same emotion. On the contrary, every work\nproduces a different emotion. But all these emotions are recognisably\nthe same in kind; so far, at any rate, the best opinion is on my side.\nThat there is a particular kind of emotion provoked by works of visual\nart, and that this emotion is provoked by every kind of visual art, by\npictures, sculptures, buildings, pots, carvings, textiles, &c., &c., is\nnot disputed, I think, by anyone capable of feeling it. This emotion is\ncalled the aesthetic emotion; and if we can discover some quality common\nand peculiar to all the objects that provoke it, we shall have solved\nwhat I take to be the central problem of aesthetics. We shall have\ndiscovered the essential quality in a work of art, the quality that\ndistinguishes works of art from all other classes of objects.\n\nFor either all works of visual art have some common quality, or when we\nspeak of \"works of art\" we gibber. Everyone speaks of \"art,\" making a\nmental classification by which he distinguishes the class \"works of art\"\nfrom all other classes. What is the justification of this\nclassification? What is the quality common and peculiar to all members\nof this class? Whatever it be, no doubt it is often found in company\nwith other qualities; but they are adventitious--it is essential. There\nmust be some one quality without which a work of art cannot exist;\npossessing which, in the least degree, no work is altogether worthless.\nWhat is this quality? What quality is shared by all objects that provoke\nour aesthetic emotions? What quality is common to Sta. Sophia and the\nwindows at Chartres, Mexican sculpture, a Persian bowl, Chinese carpets,\nGiotto's frescoes at Padua, and the masterpieces of Poussin, Piero della\nFrancesca, and Cezanne? Only one answer seems possible--significant\nform. In each, lines and colours combined in a particular way, certain\nforms and relations of forms, stir our aesthetic emotions. These\nrelations and combinations of lines and colours, these aesthetically\nmoving forms, I call \"Significant Form\"; and \"Significant Form\" is the\none quality common to all works of visual art.\n\nAt this point it may be objected that I am making aesthetics a purely\nsubjective business, since my only data are personal experiences of a\nparticular emotion. It will be said that the objects that provoke this\nemotion vary with each individual, and that therefore a system of\naesthetics can have no objective validity. It must be replied that any\nsystem of aesthetics which pretends to be based on some objective truth\nis so palpably ridiculous as not to be worth discussing. We have no\nother means of recognising a work of art than our feeling for it. The\nobjects that provoke aesthetic emotion vary with each individual.\nAesthetic judgments are, as the saying goes, matters of taste; and about\ntastes, as everyone is proud to admit, there is no disputing. A good\ncritic may be able to make me see in a picture that had left me cold\nthings that I had overlooked, till at last, receiving the aesthetic\nemotion, I recognise it as a work of art. To be continually pointing out\nthose parts, the sum, or rather the combination, of which unite to\nproduce significant form, is the function of criticism. But it is\nuseless for a critic to tell me that something is a work of art; he must\nmake me feel it for myself. This he can do only by making me see; he\nmust get at my emotions through my eyes. Unless he can make me see\nsomething that moves me, he cannot force my emotions. I have no right to\nconsider anything a work of art to which I cannot react emotionally; and\nI have no right to look for the essential quality in anything that I\nhave not _felt_ to be a work of art. The critic can affect my aesthetic\ntheories only by affecting my aesthetic experience. All systems of\naesthetics must be based on personal experience--that is to say, they\nmust be subjective.\n\nYet, though all aesthetic theories must be based on aesthetic judgments,\nand ultimately all aesthetic judgments must be matters of personal\ntaste, it would be rash to assert that no theory of aesthetics can have\ngeneral validity. For, though A, B, C, D are the works that move me, and\nA, D, E, F the works that move you, it may well be that _x_ is the only\nquality believed by either of us to be common to all the works in his\nlist. We may all agree about aesthetics, and yet differ about particular\nworks of art. We may differ as to the presence or absence of the quality\n_x_. My immediate object will be to show that significant form is the\nonly quality common and peculiar to all the works of visual art that\nmove me; and I will ask those whose aesthetic experience does not tally\nwith mine to see whether this quality is not also, in their judgment,\ncommon to all works that move them, and whether they can discover any\nother quality of which the same can be said.\n\nAlso at this point a query arises, irrelevant indeed, but hardly to be\nsuppressed: \"Why are we so profoundly moved by forms related in a\nparticular way?\" The question is extremely interesting, but irrelevant\nto aesthetics. In pure aesthetics we have only to consider our emotion\nand its object: for the purposes of aesthetics we have no right, neither\nis there any necessity, to pry behind the object into the state of mind\nof him who made it. Later, I shall attempt to answer the question; for\nby so doing I may be able to develop my theory of the relation of art to\nlife. I shall not, however, be under the delusion that I am rounding off\nmy theory of aesthetics. For a discussion of aesthetics, it need be\nagreed only that forms arranged and combined according to certain\nunknown and mysterious laws do move us in a particular way, and that it\nis the business of an artist so to combine and arrange them that they\nshall move us. These moving combinations and arrangements I have called,\nfor the sake of convenience and for a reason that will appear later,\n\"Significant Form.\"\n\nA third interruption has to be met. \"Are you forgetting about colour?\"\nsomeone inquires. Certainly not; my term \"significant form\" included\ncombinations of lines and of colours. The distinction between form and\ncolour is an unreal one; you cannot conceive a colourless line or a\ncolourless space; neither can you conceive a formless relation of\ncolours. In a black and white drawing the spaces are all white and all\nare bounded by black lines; in most oil paintings the spaces are\nmulti-coloured and so are the boundaries; you cannot imagine a boundary\nline without any content, or a content without a boundary line.\nTherefore, when I speak of significant form, I mean a combination of\nlines and colours (counting white and black as colours) that moves me\naesthetically.\n\nSome people may be surprised at my not having called this \"beauty.\" Of\ncourse, to those who define beauty as \"combinations of lines and colours\nthat provoke aesthetic emotion,\" I willingly concede the right of\nsubstituting their word for mine. But most of us, however strict we may\nbe, are apt to apply the epithet \"beautiful\" to objects that do not\nprovoke that peculiar emotion produced by works of art. Everyone, I\nsuspect, has called a butterfly or a flower beautiful. Does anyone feel\nthe same kind of emotion for a butterfly or a flower that he feels for\na cathedral or a picture? Surely, it is not what I call an aesthetic\nemotion that most of us feel, generally, for natural beauty. I shall\nsuggest, later, that some people may, occasionally, see in nature what\nwe see in art, and feel for her an aesthetic emotion; but I am satisfied\nthat, as a rule, most people feel a very different kind of emotion for\nbirds and flowers and the wings of butterflies from that which they feel\nfor pictures, pots, temples and statues. Why these beautiful things do\nnot move us as works of art move is another, and not an aesthetic,\nquestion. For our immediate purpose we have to discover only what\nquality is common to objects that do move us as works of art. In the\nlast part of this chapter, when I try to answer the question--\"Why are\nwe so profoundly moved by some combinations of lines and colours?\" I\nshall hope to offer an acceptable explanation of why we are less\nprofoundly moved by others.\n\nSince we call a quality that does not raise the characteristic aesthetic\nemotion \"Beauty,\" it would be misleading to call by the same name the\nquality that does. To make \"beauty\" the object of the aesthetic emotion,\nwe must give to the word an over-strict and unfamiliar definition.\nEveryone sometimes uses \"beauty\" in an unaesthetic sense; most people\nhabitually do so. To everyone, except perhaps here and there an\noccasional aesthete, the commonest sense of the word is unaesthetic. Of\nits grosser abuse, patent in our chatter about \"beautiful huntin'\" and\n\"beautiful shootin',\" I need not take account; it would be open to the\nprecious to reply that they never do so abuse it. Besides, here there is\nno danger of confusion between the aesthetic and the non-aesthetic use;\nbut when we speak of a beautiful woman there is. When an ordinary man\nspeaks of a beautiful woman he certainly does not mean only that she\nmoves him aesthetically; but when an artist calls a withered old hag\nbeautiful he may sometimes mean what he means when he calls a battered\ntorso beautiful. The ordinary man, if he be also a man of taste, will\ncall the battered torso beautiful, but he will not call a withered hag\nbeautiful because, in the matter of women, it is not to the aesthetic\nquality that the hag may possess, but to some other quality that he\nassigns the epithet. Indeed, most of us never dream of going for\naesthetic emotions to human beings, from whom we ask something very\ndifferent. This \"something,\" when we find it in a young woman, we are\napt to call \"beauty.\" We live in a nice age. With the man-in-the-street\n\"beautiful\" is more often than not synonymous with \"desirable\"; the word\ndoes not necessarily connote any aesthetic reaction whatever, and I am\ntempted to believe that in the minds of many the sexual flavour of the\nword is stronger than the aesthetic. I have noticed a consistency in\nthose to whom the most beautiful thing in the world is a beautiful\nwoman, and the next most beautiful thing a picture of one. The confusion\nbetween aesthetic and sensual beauty is not in their case so great as\nmight be supposed. Perhaps there is none; for perhaps they have never\nhad an aesthetic emotion to confuse with their other emotions. The art\nthat they call \"beautiful\" is generally closely related to the women. A\nbeautiful picture is a photograph of a pretty girl; beautiful music, the\nmusic that provokes emotions similar to those provoked by young ladies\nin musical farces; and beautiful poetry, the poetry that recalls the\nsame emotions felt, twenty years earlier, for the rector's daughter.\nClearly the word \"beauty\" is used to connote the objects of quite\ndistinguishable emotions, and that is a reason for not employing a term\nwhich would land me inevitably in confusions and misunderstandings with\nmy readers.\n\nOn the other hand, with those who judge it more exact to call these\ncombinations and arrangements of form that provoke our aesthetic\nemotions, not \"significant form,\" but \"significant relations of form,\"\nand then try to make the best of two worlds, the aesthetic and the\nmetaphysical, by calling these relations \"rhythm,\" I have no quarrel\nwhatever. Having made it clear that by \"significant form\" I mean\narrangements and combinations that move us in a particular way, I\nwillingly join hands with those who prefer to give a different name to\nthe same thing.\n\nThe hypothesis that significant form is the essential quality in a work\nof art has at least one merit denied to many more famous and more\nstriking--it does help to explain things. We are all familiar with\npictures that interest us and excite our admiration, but do not move us\nas works of art. To this class belongs what I call \"Descriptive\nPainting\"--that is, painting in which forms are used not as objects of\nemotion, but as means of suggesting emotion or conveying information.\nPortraits of psychological and historical value, topographical works,\npictures that tell stories and suggest situations, illustrations of all\nsorts, belong to this class. That we all recognise the distinction is\nclear, for who has not said that such and such a drawing was excellent\nas illustration, but as a work of art worthless? Of course many\ndescriptive pictures possess, amongst other qualities, formal\nsignificance, and are therefore works of art: but many more do not. They\ninterest us; they may move us too in a hundred different ways, but they\ndo not move us aesthetically. According to my hypothesis they are not\nworks of art. They leave untouched our aesthetic emotions because it is\nnot their forms but the ideas or information suggested or conveyed by\ntheir forms that affect us.\n\nFew pictures are better known or liked than Frith's \"Paddington\nStation\"; certainly I should be the last to grudge it its popularity.\nMany a weary forty minutes have I whiled away disentangling its\nfascinating incidents and forging for each an imaginary past and an\nimprobable future. But certain though it is that Frith's masterpiece,\nor engravings of it, have provided thousands with half-hours of curious\nand fanciful pleasure, it is not less certain that no one has\nexperienced before it one half-second of aesthetic rapture--and this\nalthough the picture contains several pretty passages of colour, and is\nby no means badly painted. \"Paddington Station\" is not a work of art; it\nis an interesting and amusing document. In it line and colour are used\nto recount anecdotes, suggest ideas, and indicate the manners and\ncustoms of an age: they are not used to provoke aesthetic emotion. Forms\nand the relations of forms were for Frith not objects of emotion, but\nmeans of suggesting emotion and conveying ideas.\n\nThe ideas and information conveyed by \"Paddington Station\" are so\namusing and so well presented that the picture has considerable value\nand is well worth preserving. But, with the perfection of photographic\nprocesses and of the cinematograph, pictures of this sort are becoming\notiose. Who doubts that one of those _Daily Mirror_ photographers in\ncollaboration with a _Daily Mail_ reporter can tell us far more about\n\"London day by day\" than any Royal Academician? For an account of\nmanners and fashions we shall go, in future, to photographs, supported\nby a little bright journalism, rather than to descriptive painting. Had\nthe imperial academicians of Nero, instead of manufacturing incredibly\nloathsome imitations of the antique, recorded in fresco and mosaic the\nmanners and fashions of their day, their stuff, though artistic rubbish,\nwould now be an historical gold-mine. If only they had been Friths\ninstead of being Alma Tademas! But photography has made impossible any\nsuch transmutation of modern rubbish. Therefore it must be confessed\nthat pictures in the Frith tradition are grown superfluous; they merely\nwaste the hours of able men who might be more profitably employed in\nworks of a wider beneficence. Still, they are not unpleasant, which is\nmore than can be said for that kind of descriptive painting of which\n\"The Doctor\" is the most flagrant example. Of course \"The Doctor\" is not\na work of art. In it form is not used as an object of emotion, but as a\nmeans of suggesting emotions. This alone suffices to make it nugatory;\nit is worse than nugatory because the emotion it suggests is false. What\nit suggests is not pity and admiration but a sense of complacency in our\nown pitifulness and generosity. It is sentimental. Art is above morals,\nor, rather, all art is moral because, as I hope to show presently, works\nof art are immediate means to good. Once we have judged a thing a work\nof art, we have judged it ethically of the first importance and put it\nbeyond the reach of the moralist. But descriptive pictures which are not\nworks of art, and, therefore, are not necessarily means to good states\nof mind, are proper objects of the ethical philosopher's attention. Not\nbeing a work of art, \"The Doctor\" has none of the immense ethical value\npossessed by all objects that provoke aesthetic ecstasy; and the state\nof mind to which it is a means, as illustration, appears to me\nundesirable.\n\nThe works of those enterprising young men, the Italian Futurists, are\nnotable examples of descriptive painting. Like the Royal Academicians,\nthey use form, not to provoke aesthetic emotions, but to convey\ninformation and ideas. Indeed, the published theories of the Futurists\nprove that their pictures ought to have nothing whatever to do with art.\nTheir social and political theories are respectable, but I would suggest\nto young Italian painters that it is possible to become a Futurist in\nthought and action and yet remain an artist, if one has the luck to be\nborn one. To associate art with politics is always a mistake. Futurist\npictures are descriptive because they aim at presenting in line and\ncolour the chaos of the mind at a particular moment; their forms are not\nintended to promote aesthetic emotion but to convey information. These\nforms, by the way, whatever may be the nature of the ideas they suggest,\nare themselves anything but revolutionary. In such Futurist pictures as\nI have seen--perhaps I should except some by Severini--the drawing,\nwhenever it becomes representative as it frequently does, is found to be\nin that soft and common convention brought into fashion by Besnard some\nthirty years ago, and much affected by Beaux-Art students ever since. As\nworks of art, the Futurist pictures are negligible; but they are not to\nbe judged as works of art. A good Futurist picture would succeed as a\ngood piece of psychology succeeds; it would reveal, through line and\ncolour, the complexities of an interesting state of mind. If Futurist\npictures seem to fail, we must seek an explanation, not in a lack of\nartistic qualities that they never were intended to possess, but rather\nin the minds the states of which they are intended to reveal.\n\nMost people who care much about art find that of the work that moves\nthem most the greater part is what scholars call \"Primitive.\" Of course\nthere are bad primitives. For instance, I remember going, full of\nenthusiasm, to see one of the earliest Romanesque churches in Poitiers\n(Notre-Dame-la-Grande), and finding it as ill-proportioned,\nover-decorated, coarse, fat and heavy as any better class building by\none of those highly civilised architects who flourished a thousand years\nearlier or eight hundred later. But such exceptions are rare. As a rule\nprimitive art is good--and here again my hypothesis is helpful--for, as\na rule, it is also free from descriptive qualities. In primitive art you\nwill find no accurate representation; you will find only significant\nform. Yet no other art moves us so profoundly. Whether we consider\nSumerian sculpture or pre-dynastic Egyptian art, or archaic Greek, or\nthe Wei and T'ang masterpieces,[1] or those early Japanese works of\nwhich I had the luck to see a few superb examples (especially two\nwooden Bodhisattvas) at the Shepherd's Bush Exhibition in 1910, or\nwhether, coming nearer home, we consider the primitive Byzantine art of\nthe sixth century and its primitive developments amongst the Western\nbarbarians, or, turning far afield, we consider that mysterious and\nmajestic art that flourished in Central and South America before the\ncoming of the white men, in every case we observe three common\ncharacteristics--absence of representation, absence of technical\nswagger, sublimely impressive form. Nor is it hard to discover the\nconnection between these three. Formal significance loses itself in\npreoccupation with exact representation and ostentatious cunning.[2]\n\nNaturally, it is said that if there is little representation and less\nsaltimbancery in primitive art, that is because the primitives were\nunable to catch a likeness or cut intellectual capers. The contention is\nbeside the point. There is truth in it, no doubt, though, were I a\ncritic whose reputation depended on a power of impressing the public\nwith a semblance of knowledge, I should be more cautious about urging it\nthan such people generally are. For to suppose that the Byzantine\nmasters wanted skill, or could not have created an illusion had they\nwished to do so, seems to imply ignorance of the amazingly dexterous\nrealism of the notoriously bad works of that age. Very often, I fear,\nthe misrepresentation of the primitives must be attributed to what the\ncritics call, \"wilful distortion.\" Be that as it may, the point is that,\neither from want of skill or want of will, primitives neither create\nillusions, nor make display of extravagant accomplishment, but\nconcentrate their energies on the one thing needful--the creation of\nform. Thus have they created the finest works of art that we possess.\n\nLet no one imagine that representation is bad in itself; a realistic\nform may be as significant, in its place as part of the design, as an\nabstract. But if a representative form has value, it is as form, not as\nrepresentation. The representative element in a work of art may or may\nnot be harmful; always it is irrelevant. For, to appreciate a work of\nart we need bring with us nothing from life, no knowledge of its ideas\nand affairs, no familiarity with its emotions. Art transports us from\nthe world of man's activity to a world of aesthetic exaltation. For a\nmoment we are shut off from human interests; our anticipations and\nmemories are arrested; we are lifted above the stream of life. The pure\nmathematician rapt in his studies knows a state of mind which I take to\nbe similar, if not identical. He feels an emotion for his speculations\nwhich arises from no perceived relation between them and the lives of\nmen, but springs, inhuman or super-human, from the heart of an abstract\nscience. I wonder, sometimes, whether the appreciators of art and of\nmathematical solutions are not even more closely allied. Before we feel\nan aesthetic emotion for a combination of forms, do we not perceive\nintellectually the rightness and necessity of the combination? If we do,\nit would explain the fact that passing rapidly through a room we\nrecognise a picture to be good, although we cannot say that it has\nprovoked much emotion. We seem to have recognised intellectually the\nrightness of its forms without staying to fix our attention, and\ncollect, as it were, their emotional significance. If this were so, it\nwould be permissible to inquire whether it was the forms themselves or\nour perception of their rightness and necessity that caused aesthetic\nemotion. But I do not think I need linger to discuss the matter here. I\nhave been inquiring why certain combinations of forms move us; I should\nnot have travelled by other roads had I enquired, instead, why certain\ncombinations are perceived to be right and necessary, and why our\nperception of their rightness and necessity is moving. What I have to\nsay is this: the rapt philosopher, and he who contemplates a work of\nart, inhabit a world with an intense and peculiar significance of its\nown; that significance is unrelated to the significance of life. In\nthis world the emotions of life find no place. It is a world with\nemotions of its own.\n\nTo appreciate a work of art we need bring with us nothing but a sense of\nform and colour and a knowledge of three-dimensional space. That bit of\nknowledge, I admit, is essential to the appreciation of many great\nworks, since many of the most moving forms ever created are in three\ndimensions. To see a cube or a rhomboid as a flat pattern is to lower\nits significance, and a sense of three-dimensional space is essential to\nthe full appreciation of most architectural forms. Pictures which would\nbe insignificant if we saw them as flat patterns are profoundly moving\nbecause, in fact, we see them as related planes. If the representation\nof three-dimensional space is to be called \"representation,\" then I\nagree that there is one kind of representation which is not irrelevant.\nAlso, I agree that along with our feeling for line and colour we must\nbring with us our knowledge of space if we are to make the most of every\nkind of form. Nevertheless, there are magnificent designs to an\nappreciation of which this knowledge is not necessary: so, though it is\nnot irrelevant to the appreciation of some works of art it is not\nessential to the appreciation of all. What we must say is that the\nrepresentation of three-dimensional space is neither irrelevant nor\nessential to all art, and that every other sort of representation is\nirrelevant.\n\nThat there is an irrelevant representative or descriptive element in\nmany great works of art is not in the least surprising. Why it is not\nsurprising I shall try to show elsewhere. Representation is not of\nnecessity baneful, and highly realistic forms may be extremely\nsignificant. Very often, however, representation is a sign of weakness\nin an artist. A painter too feeble to create forms that provoke more\nthan a little aesthetic emotion will try to eke that little out by\nsuggesting the emotions of life. To evoke the emotions of life he must\nuse representation. Thus a man will paint an execution, and, fearing to\nmiss with his first barrel of significant form, will try to hit with his\nsecond by raising an emotion of fear or pity. But if in the artist an\ninclination to play upon the emotions of life is often the sign of a\nflickering inspiration, in the spectator a tendency to seek, behind\nform, the emotions of life is a sign of defective sensibility always. It\nmeans that his aesthetic emotions are weak or, at any rate, imperfect.\nBefore a work of art people who feel little or no emotion for pure form\nfind themselves at a loss. They are deaf men at a concert. They know\nthat they are in the presence of something great, but they lack the\npower of apprehending it. They know that they ought to feel for it a\ntremendous emotion, but it happens that the particular kind of emotion\nit can raise is one that they can feel hardly or not at all. And so they\nread into the forms of the work those facts and ideas for which they are\ncapable of feeling emotion, and feel for them the emotions that they can\nfeel--the ordinary emotions of life. When confronted by a picture,\ninstinctively they refer back its forms to the world from which they\ncame. They treat created form as though it were imitated form, a picture\nas though it were a photograph. Instead of going out on the stream of\nart into a new world of aesthetic experience, they turn a sharp corner\nand come straight home to the world of human interests. For them the\nsignificance of a work of art depends on what they bring to it; no new\nthing is added to their lives, only the old material is stirred. A good\nwork of visual art carries a person who is capable of appreciating it\nout of life into ecstasy: to use art as a means to the emotions of life\nis to use a telescope for reading the news. You will notice that people\nwho cannot feel pure aesthetic emotions remember pictures by their\nsubjects; whereas people who can, as often as not, have no idea what the\nsubject of a picture is. They have never noticed the representative\nelement, and so when they discuss pictures they talk about the shapes of\nforms and the relations and quantities of colours. Often they can tell\nby the quality of a single line whether or no a man is a good artist.\nThey are concerned only with lines and colours, their relations and\nquantities and qualities; but from these they win an emotion more\nprofound and far more sublime than any that can be given by the\ndescription of facts and ideas.\n\nThis last sentence has a very confident ring--over-confident, some may\nthink. Perhaps I shall be able to justify it, and make my meaning\nclearer too, if I give an account of my own feelings about music. I am\nnot really musical. I do not understand music well. I find musical form\nexceedingly difficult to apprehend, and I am sure that the profounder\nsubtleties of harmony and rhythm more often than not escape me. The\nform of a musical composition must be simple indeed if I am to grasp it\nhonestly. My opinion about music is not worth having. Yet, sometimes, at\na concert, though my appreciation of the music is limited and humble, it\nis pure. Sometimes, though I have a poor understanding, I have a clean\npalate. Consequently, when I am feeling bright and clear and intent, at\nthe beginning of a concert for instance, when something that I can grasp\nis being played, I get from music that pure aesthetic emotion that I get\nfrom visual art. It is less intense, and the rapture is evanescent; I\nunderstand music too ill for music to transport me far into the world of\npure aesthetic ecstasy. But at moments I do appreciate music as pure\nmusical form, as sounds combined according to the laws of a mysterious\nnecessity, as pure art with a tremendous significance of its own and no\nrelation whatever to the significance of life; and in those moments I\nlose myself in that infinitely sublime state of mind to which pure\nvisual form transports me. How inferior is my normal state of mind at a\nconcert. Tired or perplexed, I let slip my sense of form, my aesthetic\nemotion collapses, and I begin weaving into the harmonies, that I\ncannot grasp, the ideas of life. Incapable of feeling the austere\nemotions of art, I begin to read into the musical forms human emotions\nof terror and mystery, love and hate, and spend the minutes, pleasantly\nenough, in a world of turbid and inferior feeling. At such times, were\nthe grossest pieces of onomatopoeic representation--the song of a bird,\nthe galloping of horses, the cries of children, or the laughing of\ndemons--to be introduced into the symphony, I should not be offended.\nVery likely I should be pleased; they would afford new points of\ndeparture for new trains of romantic feeling or heroic thought. I know\nvery well what has happened. I have been using art as a means to the\nemotions of life and reading into it the ideas of life. I have been\ncutting blocks with a razor. I have tumbled from the superb peaks of\naesthetic exaltation to the snug foothills of warm humanity. It is a\njolly country. No one need be ashamed of enjoying himself there. Only no\none who has ever been on the heights can help feeling a little\ncrestfallen in the cosy valleys. And let no one imagine, because he has\nmade merry in the warm tilth and quaint nooks of romance, that he can\neven guess at the austere and thrilling raptures of those who have\nclimbed the cold, white peaks of art.\n\nAbout music most people are as willing to be humble as I am. If they\ncannot grasp musical form and win from it a pure aesthetic emotion, they\nconfess that they understand music imperfectly or not at all. They\nrecognise quite clearly that there is a difference between the feeling\nof the musician for pure music and that of the cheerful concert-goer for\nwhat music suggests. The latter enjoys his own emotions, as he has every\nright to do, and recognises their inferiority. Unfortunately, people are\napt to be less modest about their powers of appreciating visual art.\nEveryone is inclined to believe that out of pictures, at any rate, he\ncan get all that there is to be got; everyone is ready to cry \"humbug\"\nand \"impostor\" at those who say that more can be had. The good faith of\npeople who feel pure aesthetic emotions is called in question by those\nwho have never felt anything of the sort. It is the prevalence of the\nrepresentative element, I suppose, that makes the man in the street so\nsure that he knows a good picture when he sees one. For I have noticed\nthat in matters of architecture, pottery, textiles, &c., ignorance and\nineptitude are more willing to defer to the opinions of those who have\nbeen blest with peculiar sensibility. It is a pity that cultivated and\nintelligent men and women cannot be induced to believe that a great gift\nof aesthetic appreciation is at least as rare in visual as in musical\nart. A comparison of my own experience in both has enabled me to\ndiscriminate very clearly between pure and impure appreciation. Is it\ntoo much to ask that others should be as honest about their feelings for\npictures as I have been about mine for music? For I am certain that most\nof those who visit galleries do feel very much what I feel at concerts.\nThey have their moments of pure ecstasy; but the moments are short and\nunsure. Soon they fall back into the world of human interests and feel\nemotions, good no doubt, but inferior. I do not dream of saying that\nwhat they get from art is bad or nugatory; I say that they do not get\nthe best that art can give. I do not say that they cannot understand\nart; rather I say that they cannot understand the state of mind of those\nwho understand it best. I do not say that art means nothing or little to\nthem; I say they miss its full significance. I do not suggest for one\nmoment that their appreciation of art is a thing to be ashamed of; the\nmajority of the charming and intelligent people with whom I am\nacquainted appreciate visual art impurely; and, by the way, the\nappreciation of almost all great writers has been impure. But provided\nthat there be some fraction of pure aesthetic emotion, even a mixed and\nminor appreciation of art is, I am sure, one of the most valuable things\nin the world--so valuable, indeed, that in my giddier moments I have\nbeen tempted to believe that art might prove the world's salvation.\n\nYet, though the echoes and shadows of art enrich the life of the plains,\nher spirit dwells on the mountains. To him who woos, but woos impurely,\nshe returns enriched what is brought. Like the sun, she warms the good\nseed in good soil and causes it to bring forth good fruit. But only to\nthe perfect lover does she give a new strange gift--a gift beyond all\nprice. Imperfect lovers bring to art and take away the ideas and\nemotions of their own age and civilisation. In twelfth-century Europe a\nman might have been greatly moved by a Romanesque church and found\nnothing in a T'ang picture. To a man of a later age, Greek sculpture\nmeant much and Mexican nothing, for only to the former could he bring a\ncrowd of associated ideas to be the objects of familiar emotions. But\nthe perfect lover, he who can feel the profound significance of form, is\nraised above the accidents of time and place. To him the problems of\narchaeology, history, and hagiography are impertinent. If the forms of a\nwork are significant its provenance is irrelevant. Before the grandeur\nof those Sumerian figures in the Louvre he is carried on the same flood\nof emotion to the same aesthetic ecstasy as, more than four thousand\nyears ago, the Chaldean lover was carried. It is the mark of great art\nthat its appeal is universal and eternal.[3] Significant form stands\ncharged with the power to provoke aesthetic emotion in anyone capable of\nfeeling it. The ideas of men go buzz and die like gnats; men change\ntheir institutions and their customs as they change their coats; the\nintellectual triumphs of one age are the follies of another; only great\nart remains stable and unobscure. Great art remains stable and unobscure\nbecause the feelings that it awakens are independent of time and place,\nbecause its kingdom is not of this world. To those who have and hold a\nsense of the significance of form what does it matter whether the forms\nthat move them were created in Paris the day before yesterday or in\nBabylon fifty centuries ago? The forms of art are inexhaustible; but all\nlead by the same road of aesthetic emotion to the same world of\naesthetic ecstasy.\n\n\n\n\nII\n\nAESTHETICS AND POST-IMPRESSIONISM\n\n\nBy the light of my aesthetic hypothesis I can read more clearly than\nbefore the history of art; also I can see in that history the place of\nthe contemporary movement. As I shall have a great deal to say about the\ncontemporary movement, perhaps I shall do well to seize this moment,\nwhen the aesthetic hypothesis is fresh in my mind and, I hope, in the\nminds of my readers, for an examination of the movement in relation to\nthe hypothesis. For anyone of my generation to write a book about art\nthat said nothing of the movement dubbed in this country\nPost-Impressionist would be a piece of pure affectation. I shall have a\ngreat deal to say about it, and therefore I wish to see at the earliest\npossible opportunity how Post-Impressionism stands with regard to my\ntheory of aesthetics. The survey will give me occasion for stating some\nof the things that Post-Impressionism is and some that it is not. I\nshall have to raise points that will be dealt with at greater length\nelsewhere. Here I shall have a chance of raising them, and at least\nsuggesting a solution.\n\nPrimitives produce art because they must; they have no other motive than\na passionate desire to express their sense of form. Untempted, or\nincompetent, to create illusions, to the creation of form they devote\nthemselves entirely. Presently, however, the artist is joined by a\npatron and a public, and soon there grows up a demand for \"speaking\nlikenesses.\" While the gross herd still clamours for likeness, the\nchoicer spirits begin to affect an admiration for cleverness and skill.\nThe end is in sight. In Europe we watch art sinking, by slow degrees,\nfrom the thrilling design of Ravenna to the tedious portraiture of\nHolland, while the grand proportion of Romanesque and Norman\narchitecture becomes Gothic juggling in stone and glass. Before the late\nnoon of the Renaissance art was almost extinct. Only nice illusionists\nand masters of craft abounded. That was the moment for a\nPost-Impressionist revival.\n\nFor various reasons there was no revolution. The tradition of art\nremained comatose. Here and there a genius appeared and wrestled with\nthe coils of convention and created significant form. For instance, the\nart of Nicolas Poussin, Claude, El Greco, Chardin, Ingres, and Renoir,\nto name a few, moves us as that of Giotto and Cezanne moves. The bulk,\nhowever, of those who flourished between the high Renaissance and the\ncontemporary movement may be divided into two classes, virtuosi and\ndunces. The clever fellows, the minor masters, who might have been\nartists if painting had not absorbed all their energies, were throughout\nthat period for ever setting themselves technical acrostics and solving\nthem. The dunces continued to elaborate chromophotographs, and continue.\n\nThe fact that significant form was the only common quality in the works\nthat moved me, and that in the works that moved me most and seemed most\nto move the most sensitive people--in primitive art, that is to say--it\nwas almost the only quality, had led me to my hypothesis before ever I\nbecame familiar with the works of Cezanne and his followers. Cezanne\ncarried me off my feet before ever I noticed that his strongest\ncharacteristic was an insistence on the supremacy of significant form.\nWhen I noticed this, my admiration for Cezanne and some of his followers\nconfirmed me in my aesthetic theories. Naturally I had found no\ndifficulty in liking them since I found in them exactly what I liked in\neverything else that moved me.\n\nThere is no mystery about Post-Impressionism; a good Post-Impressionist\npicture is good for precisely the same reasons that any other picture is\ngood. The essential quality in art is permanent. Post-Impressionism,\ntherefore, implies no violent break with the past. It is merely a\ndeliberate rejection of certain hampering traditions of modern growth.\nIt does deny that art need ever take orders from the past; but that is\nnot a badge of Post-Impressionism, it is the commonest mark of vitality.\nEven to speak of Post-Impressionism as a movement may lead to\nmisconceptions; the habit of speaking of movements at all is rather\nmisleading. The stream of art has never run utterly dry: it flows\nthrough the ages, now broad now narrow, now deep now shallow, now rapid\nnow sluggish: its colour is changing always. But who can set a mark\nagainst the exact point of change? In the earlier nineteenth century\nthe stream ran very low. In the days of the Impressionists, against whom\nthe contemporary movement is in some ways a reaction, it had already\nbecome copious. Any attempt to dam and imprison this river, to choose\nout a particular school or movement and say: \"Here art begins and there\nit ends,\" is a pernicious absurdity. That way Academization lies. At\nthis moment there are not above half a dozen good painters alive who do\nnot derive, to some extent, from Cezanne, and belong, in some sense, to\nthe Post-Impressionist movement; but tomorrow a great painter may arise\nwho will create significant form by means superficially opposed to those\nof Cezanne. Superficially, I say, because, essentially, all good art is\nof the same movement: there are only two kinds of art, good and bad.\nNevertheless, the division of the stream into reaches, distinguished by\ndifferences of manner, is intelligible and, to historians at any rate,\nuseful. The reaches also differ from each other in volume; one period of\nart is distinguished from another by its fertility. For a few fortunate\nyears or decades the output of considerable art is great. Suddenly it\nceases; or slowly it dwindles: a movement has exhausted itself. How far\na movement is made by the fortuitous synchronisation of a number of\ngood artists, and how far the artists are helped to the creation of\nsignificant form by the pervasion of some underlying spirit of the age,\nis a question that can never be decided beyond cavil. But however the\ncredit is to be apportioned--and I suspect it should be divided about\nequally--we are justified, I think, looking at the history of art as a\nwhole, in regarding such periods of fertility as distinct parts of that\nwhole. Primarily, it is as a period of fertility in good art and artists\nthat I admire the Post-Impressionist movement. Also, I believe that the\nprinciples which underlie and inspire that movement are more likely to\nencourage artists to give of their best, and to foster a good tradition,\nthan any of which modern history bears record. But my interest in this\nmovement, and my admiration for much of the art it has produced, does\nnot blind me to the greatness of the products of other movements;\nneither, I hope, will it blind me to the greatness of any new creation\nof form even though that novelty may seem to imply a reaction against\nthe tradition of Cezanne.\n\nLike all sound revolutions, Post-Impressionism is nothing more than a\nreturn to first principles. Into a world where the painter was expected\nto be either a photographer or an acrobat burst the Post-Impressionist,\nclaiming that, above all things, he should be an artist. Never mind,\nsaid he, about representation or accomplishment--mind about creating\nsignificant form, mind about art. Creating a work of art is so\ntremendous a business that it leaves no leisure for catching a likeness\nor displaying address. Every sacrifice made to representation is\nsomething stolen from art. Far from being the insolent kind of\nrevolution it is vulgarly supposed to be, Post-Impressionism is, in\nfact, a return, not indeed to any particular tradition of painting, but\nto the great tradition of visual art. It sets before every artist the\nideal set before themselves by the primitives, an ideal which, since the\ntwelfth century, has been cherished only by exceptional men of genius.\nPost-Impressionism is nothing but the reassertion of the first\ncommandment of art--Thou shalt create form. By this assertion it shakes\nhands across the ages with the Byzantine primitives and with every vital\nmovement that has struggled into existence since the arts began.\n\nPost-Impressionism is not a matter of technique. Certainly Cezanne\ninvented a technique, admirably suited to his purpose, which has been\nadopted and elaborated, more or less, by the majority of his followers.\nThe important thing about a picture, however, is not how it is painted,\nbut whether it provokes aesthetic emotion. As I have said, essentially,\na good Post-Impressionist picture resembles all other good works of art,\nand only differs from some, superficially, by a conscious and deliberate\nrejection of those technical and sentimental irrelevancies that have\nbeen imposed on painting by a bad tradition. This becomes obvious when\none visits an exhibition such as the _Salon d'Automne_ or _Les\nIndependants_, where there are hundreds of pictures in the\nPost-Impressionist manner, many of which are quite worthless.[4] These,\none realises, are bad in precisely the same way as any other picture is\nbad; their forms are insignificant and compel no aesthetic reaction. In\ntruth, it was an unfortunate necessity that obliged us to speak of\n\"Post-Impressionist pictures,\" and now, I think, the moment is at hand\nwhen we shall be able to return to the older and more adequate\nnomenclature, and speak of good pictures and bad. Only we must not\nforget that the movement of which Cezanne is the earliest manifestation,\nand which has borne so amazing a crop of good art, owes something,\nthough not everything, to the liberating and revolutionary doctrines of\nPost-Impressionism.\n\nThe silliest things said about Post-Impressionist pictures are said by\npeople who regard Post-Impressionism as an isolated movement, whereas,\nin fact, it takes its place as part of one of those huge slopes into\nwhich we can divide the history of art and the spiritual history of\nmankind. In my enthusiastic moments I am tempted to hope that it is the\nfirst stage in a new slope to which it will stand in the same relation\nas sixth-century Byzantine art stands to the old. In that case we shall\ncompare Post-Impressionism with that vital spirit which, towards the end\nof the fifth century, flickered into life amidst the ruins of\nGraeco-Roman realism. Post-Impressionism, or, let us say the\nContemporary Movement, has a future; but when that future is present\nCezanne and Matisse will no longer be called Post-Impressionists. They\nwill certainly be called great artists, just as Giotto and Masaccio are\ncalled great artists; they will be called the masters of a movement; but\nwhether that movement is destined to be more than a movement, to be\nsomething as vast as the slope that lies between Cezanne and the masters\nof S. Vitale, is a matter of much less certainty than enthusiasts care\nto suppose.\n\nPost-Impressionism is accused of being a negative and destructive creed.\nIn art no creed is healthy that is anything else. You cannot give men\ngenius; you can only give them freedom--freedom from superstition.\nPost-Impressionism can no more make good artists than good laws can make\ngood men. Doubtless, with its increasing popularity, an annually\nincreasing horde of nincompoops will employ the so-called\n\"Post-Impressionist technique\" for presenting insignificant patterns and\nrecounting foolish anecdotes. Their pictures will be dubbed\n\"Post-Impressionist,\" but only by gross injustice will they be excluded\nfrom Burlington House. Post-Impressionism is no specific against human\nfolly and incompetence. All it can do for painters is to bring before\nthem the claims of art. To the man of genius and to the student of\ntalent it can say: \"Don't waste your time and energy on things that\ndon't matter: concentrate on what does: concentrate on the creation of\nsignificant form.\" Only thus can either give the best that is in him.\nFormerly because both felt bound to strike a compromise between art and\nwhat the public had been taught to expect, the work of one was\ngrievously disfigured, that of the other ruined. Tradition ordered the\npainter to be photographer, acrobat, archaeologist and litterateur:\nPost-Impressionism invites him to become an artist.\n\n\n\n\nIII\n\nTHE METAPHYSICAL HYPOTHESIS\n\n\nFor the present I have said enough about the aesthetic problem and about\nPost-Impressionism; I want now to consider that metaphysical\nquestion--\"Why do certain arrangements and combinations of form move us\nso strangely?\" For aesthetics it suffices that they do move us; to all\nfurther inquisition of the tedious and stupid it can be replied that,\nhowever queer these things may be, they are no queerer than anything\nelse in this incredibly queer universe. But to those for whom my theory\nseems to open a vista of possibilities I willingly offer, for what they\nare worth, my fancies.\n\nIt seems to me possible, though by no means certain, that created form\nmoves us so profoundly because it expresses the emotion of its creator.\nPerhaps the lines and colours of a work of art convey to us something\nthat the artist felt. If this be so, it will explain that curious but\nundeniable fact, to which I have already referred, that what I call\nmaterial beauty (_e.g._ the wing of a butterfly) does not move most of\nus in at all the same way as a work of art moves us. It is beautiful\nform, but it is not significant form. It moves us, but it does not move\nus aesthetically. It is tempting to explain the difference between\n\"significant form\" and \"beauty\"--that is to say, the difference between\nform that provokes our aesthetic emotions and form that does not--by\nsaying that significant form conveys to us an emotion felt by its\ncreator and that beauty conveys nothing.\n\nFor what, then, does the artist feel the emotion that he is supposed to\nexpress? Sometimes it certainly comes to him through material beauty.\nThe contemplation of natural objects is often the immediate cause of the\nartist's emotion. Are we to suppose, then, that the artist feels, or\nsometimes feels, for material beauty what we feel for a work of art? Can\nit be that sometimes for the artist material beauty is somehow\nsignificant--that is, capable of provoking aesthetic emotion? And if the\nform that provokes aesthetic emotion be form that expresses something,\ncan it be that material beauty is to him expressive? Does he feel\nsomething behind it as we imagine that we feel something behind the\nforms of a work of art? Are we to suppose that the emotion which the\nartist expresses is an aesthetic emotion felt for something the\nsignificance of which commonly escapes our coarser sensibilities? All\nthese are questions about which I had sooner speculate than dogmatise.\n\nLet us hear what the artists have got to say for themselves. We readily\nbelieve them when they tell us that, in fact, they do not create works\nof art in order to provoke our aesthetic emotions, but because only thus\ncan they materialise a particular kind of feeling. What, precisely, this\nfeeling is they find it hard to say. One account of the matter, given me\nby a very good artist, is that what he tries to express in a picture is\n\"a passionate apprehension of form.\" I have set myself to discover what\nis meant by \"a passionate apprehension of form,\" and, after much talking\nand more listening, I have arrived at the following result. Occasionally\nwhen an artist--a real artist--looks at objects (the contents of a room,\nfor instance) he perceives them as pure forms in certain relations to\neach other, and feels emotion for them as such. These are his moments\nof inspiration: follows the desire to express what has been felt. The\nemotion that the artist felt in his moment of inspiration he did not\nfeel for objects seen as means, but for objects seen as pure forms--that\nis, as ends in themselves. He did not feel emotion for a chair as a\nmeans to physical well-being, nor as an object associated with the\nintimate life of a family, nor as the place where someone sat saying\nthings unforgettable, nor yet as a thing bound to the lives of hundreds\nof men and women, dead or alive, by a hundred subtle ties; doubtless an\nartist does often feel emotions such as these for the things that he\nsees, but in the moment of aesthetic vision he sees objects, not as\nmeans shrouded in associations, but as pure forms. It is for, or at any\nrate through, pure form that he feels his inspired emotion.\n\nNow to see objects as pure forms is to see them as ends in themselves.\nFor though, of course, forms are related to each other as parts of a\nwhole, they are related on terms of equality; they are not a means to\nanything except emotion. But for objects seen as ends in themselves, do\nwe not feel a profounder and a more thrilling emotion than ever we felt\nfor them as means? All of us, I imagine, do, from time to time, get a\nvision of material objects as pure forms. We see things as ends in\nthemselves, that is to say; and at such moments it seems possible, and\neven probable, that we see them with the eye of an artist. Who has not,\nonce at least in his life, had a sudden vision of landscape as pure\nform? For once, instead of seeing it as fields and cottages, he has felt\nit as lines and colours. In that moment has he not won from material\nbeauty a thrill indistinguishable from that which art gives? And, if\nthis be so, is it not clear that he has won from material beauty the\nthrill that, generally, art alone can give, because he has contrived to\nsee it as a pure formal combination of lines and colours? May we go on\nto say that, having seen it as pure form, having freed it from all\ncasual and adventitious interest, from all that it may have acquired\nfrom its commerce with human beings, from all its significance as a\nmeans, he has felt its significance as an end in itself?\n\nWhat is the significance of anything as an end in itself? What is that\nwhich is left when we have stripped a thing of all its associations, of\nall its significance as a means? What is left to provoke our emotion?\nWhat but that which philosophers used to call \"the thing in itself\" and\nnow call \"ultimate reality\"? Shall I be altogether fantastic in\nsuggesting, what some of the profoundest thinkers have believed, that\nthe significance of the thing in itself is the significance of Reality?\nIs it possible that the answer to my question, \"Why are we so profoundly\nmoved by certain combinations of lines and colours?\" should be, \"Because\nartists can express in combinations of lines and colours an emotion felt\nfor reality which reveals itself through line and colour\"?\n\nIf this suggestion were accepted it would follow that \"significant form\"\nwas form behind which we catch a sense of ultimate reality. There would\nbe good reason for supposing that the emotions which artists feel in\ntheir moments of inspiration, that others feel in the rare moments when\nthey see objects artistically, and that many of us feel when we\ncontemplate works of art, are the same in kind. All would be emotions\nfelt for reality revealing itself through pure form. It is certain that\nthis emotion can be expressed only in pure form. It is certain that most\nof us can come at it only through pure form. But is pure form the only\nchannel through which anyone can come at this mysterious emotion? That\nis a disturbing and a most distasteful question, for at this point I\nthought I saw my way to cancelling out the word \"reality,\" and saying\nthat all are emotions felt for pure form which may or may not have\nsomething behind it. To me it would be most satisfactory to say that the\nreason why some forms move us aesthetically, and others do not, is that\nsome have been so purified that we can feel them aesthetically and that\nothers are so clogged with unaesthetic matter (_e.g._ associations) that\nonly the sensibility of an artist can perceive their pure, formal\nsignificance. I should be charmed to believe that it is as certain that\neveryone must come at reality through form as that everyone must express\nhis sense of it in form. But is that so? What kind of form is that from\nwhich the musician draws the emotion that he expresses in abstract\nharmonies? Whence come the emotions of the architect and the potter? I\nknow that the artist's emotion can be expressed only in form; I know\nthat only by form can my aesthetic emotions be called into play; but can\nI be sure that it is always by form that an artist's emotion is\nprovoked? Back to reality.\n\nThose who incline to believe that the artist's emotion is felt for\nreality will readily admit that visual artists--with whom alone we are\nconcerned--come at reality generally through material form. But don't\nthey come at it sometimes through imagined form? And ought we not to add\nthat sometimes the sense of reality comes we know not whence? The best\naccount I know of this state of being rapt in a mysterious sense of\nreality is the one that Dante gives:\n\n  \"O immaginativa, che ne rube\n    tal volta si di fuor, ch' uom non s'accorge\n    perche d'intorno suonin mille tube;\n\n  chi move te, se il senso non ti porge?\n    Moveti lume, che nel ciel s'informa,\n    per se, o per voler che giu lo scorge.\n\n         *       *       *       *       *\n\n  e qui fu la mia mente si ristretta\n    dentro da se, che di fuor non venia\n    cosa che fosse allor da lei recetta.\"\n\nCertainly, in those moments of exaltation that art can give, it is easy\nto believe that we have been possessed by an emotion that comes from the\nworld of reality. Those who take this view will have to say that there\nis in all things the stuff out of which art is made--reality; artists,\neven, can grasp it only when they have reduced things to their purest\ncondition of being--to pure form--unless they be of those who come at it\nmysteriously unaided by externals; only in pure form can a sense of it\nbe expressed. On this hypothesis the peculiarity of the artist would\nseem to be that he possesses the power of surely and frequently seizing\nreality (generally behind pure form), and the power of expressing his\nsense of it, in pure form always. But many people, though they feel the\ntremendous significance of form, feel also a cautious dislike for big\nwords; and \"reality\" is a very big one. These prefer to say that what\nthe artist surprises behind form, or seizes by sheer force of\nimagination, is the all-pervading rhythm that informs all things; and I\nhave said that I will never quarrel with that blessed word \"rhythm.\"\n\nThe ultimate object of the artist's emotion will remain for ever\nuncertain. But, unless we assume that all artists are liars, I think we\nmust suppose that they do feel an emotion which they can express in\nform--and form alone. And note well this further point; artists try to\nexpress emotion, not to make statements about its ultimate or immediate\nobject. Naturally, if an artist's emotion comes to him from, or through,\nthe perception of forms and formal relations, he will be apt to express\nit in forms derived from those through which it came; but he will not be\nbound by his vision. He will be bound by his emotion. Not what he saw,\nbut only what he felt will necessarily condition his design. Whether the\nconnection between the forms of a created work and the forms of the\nvisible universe be patent or obscure, whether it exist or whether it\ndoes not, is a matter of no consequence whatever. No one ever doubted\nthat a Sung pot or a Romanesque church was as much an expression of\nemotion as any picture that ever was painted. What was the object of the\npotter's emotion? What of the builder's? Was it some imagined form, the\nsynthesis of a hundred different visions of natural things; or was it\nsome conception of reality, unrelated to sensual experience, remote\naltogether from the physical universe? These are questions beyond all\nconjecture. In any case, the form in which he expresses his emotion\nbears no memorial of any external form that may have provoked it.\nExpression is no wise bound by the forms or emotions or ideas of life.\nWe cannot know exactly what the artist feels. We only know what he\ncreates. If reality be the goal of his emotion, the roads to reality\nare several. Some artists come at it through the appearance of things,\nsome by a recollection of appearance, and some by sheer force of\nimagination.\n\nTo the question--\"Why are we so profoundly moved by certain combinations\nof forms?\" I am unwilling to return a positive answer. I am not obliged\nto, for it is not an aesthetic question. I do suggest, however, that it\nis because they express an emotion that the artist has felt, though I\nhesitate to make any pronouncement about the nature or object of that\nemotion. If my suggestion be accepted, criticism will be armed with a\nnew weapon; and the nature of this weapon is worth a moment's\nconsideration. Going behind his emotion and its object, the critic will\nbe able to surprise that which gives form its significance. He will be\nable to explain why some forms are significant and some are not; and\nthus he will be able to push all his judgments a step further back. Let\nme give one example. Of copies of pictures there are two classes; one\nclass contains some works of art, the other none. A literal copy is\nseldom reckoned even by its owner a work of art. It leaves us cold; its\nforms are not significant. Yet if it were an absolutely exact copy,\nclearly it would be as moving as the original, and a photographic\nreproduction of a drawing often is--almost. Evidently, it is impossible\nto imitate a work of art exactly; and the differences between the copy\nand the original, minute though they may be, exist and are felt\nimmediately. So far the critic is on sure and by this time familiar\nground. The copy does not move him, because its forms are not identical\nwith those of the original; and just what made the original moving is\nwhat does not appear in the copy. But why is it impossible to make an\nabsolutely exact copy? The explanation seems to be that the actual lines\nand colours and spaces in a work of art are caused by something in the\nmind of the artist which is not present in the mind of the imitator. The\nhand not only obeys the mind, it is impotent to make lines and colours\nin a particular way without the direction of a particular state of mind.\nThe two visible objects, the original and the copy, differ because that\nwhich ordered the work of art does not preside at the manufacture of the\ncopy. That which orders the work of art is, I suggest, the emotion which\nempowers artists to create significant form. The good copy, the copy\nthat moves us, is always the work of one who is possessed by this\nmysterious emotion. Good copies are never attempts at exact imitation;\non examination we find always enormous differences between them and\ntheir originals: they are the work of men or women who do not copy but\ncan translate the art of others into their own language. The power of\ncreating significant form depends, not on hawklike vision, but on some\ncurious mental and emotional power. Even to copy a picture one needs,\nnot to see as a trained observer, but to feel as an artist. To make the\nspectator feel, it seems that the creator must feel too. What is this\nthat imitated forms lack and created forms possess? What is this\nmysterious thing that dominates the artist in the creation of forms?\nWhat is it that lurks behind forms and seems to be conveyed by them to\nus? What is it that distinguishes the creator from the copyist? What can\nit be but emotion? Is it not because the artist's forms express a\nparticular kind of emotion that they are significant?--because they fit\nand envelop it, that they are coherent?--because they communicate it,\nthat they exalt us to ecstasy?\n\nOne word of warning is necessary. Let no one imagine that the expression\nof emotion is the outward and visible sign of a work of art. The\ncharacteristic of a work of art is its power of provoking aesthetic\nemotion; the expression of emotion is possibly what gives it that power.\nIt is useless to go to a picture gallery in search of expression; you\nmust go in search of significant form. When you have been moved by form,\nyou may begin to consider what makes it moving. If my theory be correct,\nrightness of form is invariably a consequence of rightness of emotion.\nRight form, I suggest, is ordered and conditioned by a particular kind\nof emotion; but whether my theory be true or false, the form remains\nright. If the forms are satisfactory, the state of mind that ordained\nthem must have been aesthetically right. If the forms are wrong, it does\nnot follow that the state of mind was wrong; between the moment of\ninspiration and the finished work of art there is room for many a slip.\nFeeble or defective emotion is at best only one explanation of\nunsatisfactory form. Therefore, when the critic comes across\nsatisfactory form he need not bother about the feelings of the artist;\nfor him to feel the aesthetic significance of the artist's forms\nsuffices. If the artist's state of mind be important, he may be sure\nthat it was right because the forms are right. But when the critic\nattempts to account for the unsatisfactoriness of forms he may consider\nthe state of mind of the artist. He cannot be sure that because the\nforms are wrong the state of mind was wrong; because right forms imply\nright feeling, wrong forms do not necessarily imply wrong feeling; but\nif he has got to explain the wrongness of form, here is a possibility he\ncannot overlook. He will have left the firm land of aesthetics to travel\nin an unstable element; in criticism one catches at any straw. There is\nno harm in that, provided the critic never forgets that, whatever\ningenious theories he may put forward, they can be nothing more than\nattempts to explain the one central fact--that some forms move us\naesthetically and others do not.\n\nThis discussion has brought me close to a question that is neither\naesthetic nor metaphysical but impinges on both. It is the question of\nthe artistic problem, and it is really a technical question. I have\nsuggested that the task of the artist is either to create significant\nform or to express a sense of reality--whichever way you prefer to put\nit. But it is certain that few artists, if any, can sit down or stand up\njust to create nothing more definite than significant form, just to\nexpress nothing more definite than a sense of reality. Artists must\ncanalise their emotion, they must concentrate their energies on some\ndefinite problem. The man who sets out with the whole world before him\nis unlikely to get anywhere. In that fact lies the explanation of the\nabsolute necessity for artistic conventions. That is why it is easier to\nwrite good verse than good prose, why it is more difficult to write good\nblank verse than good rhyming couplets. That is the explanation of the\nsonnet, the ballade, and the rondeau; severe limitations concentrate and\nintensify the artist's energies.\n\nIt would be almost impossible for an artist who set himself a task no\nmore definite than that of creating, without conditions or limitations\nmaterial or intellectual, significant form ever so to concentrate his\nenergies as to achieve his object. His objective would lack precision\nand therefore his efforts would lack intention. He would almost\ncertainly be vague and listless at his work. It would seem always\npossible to pull the thing round by a happy fluke, it would rarely be\nabsolutely clear that things were going wrong. The effort would be\nfeeble and the result would be feeble. That is the danger of\naestheticism for the artist. The man who feels that he has got nothing\nto do but to make something beautiful hardly knows where to begin or\nwhere to end, or why he should set about one thing more than another.\nThe artist has got to feel the necessity of making his work of art\n\"right.\" It will be \"right\" when it expresses his emotion for reality or\nis capable of provoking aesthetic emotion in others, whichever way you\ncare to look at it. But most artists have got to canalise their emotion\nand concentrate their energies on some more definite and more maniable\nproblem than that of making something that shall be aesthetically\n\"right.\" They need a problem that will become the focus of their vast\nemotions and vague energies, and when that problem is solved their work\nwill be \"right.\"\n\n\"Right\" for the spectator means aesthetically satisfying; for the artist\nat work it means the complete realisation of a conception, the perfect\nsolution of a problem. The mistake that the vulgar make is to suppose\nthat \"right\" means the solution of one particular problem. The vulgar\nare apt to suppose that the problem which all visual and literary\nartists set themselves is to make something lifelike. Now, all artistic\nproblems--and their possible variety is infinite--must be the _foci_ of\none particular kind of emotion, that specific artistic emotion which I\nbelieve to be an emotion felt for reality, generally perceived through\nform: but the nature of the focus is immaterial. It is almost, though\nnot quite, true to say that one problem is as good as another. Indeed\nall problems are, in themselves, equally good, though, owing to human\ninfirmity, there are two which tend to turn out badly. One, as we have\nseen, is the pure aesthetic problem; the other is the problem of\naccurate representation.\n\nThe vulgar imagine that there is but one focus, that \"right\" means\nalways the realisation of an accurate conception of life. They cannot\nunderstand that the immediate problem of the artist may be to express\nhimself within a square or a circle or a cube, to balance certain\nharmonies, to reconcile certain dissonances, to achieve certain rhythms,\nor to conquer certain difficulties of medium, just as well as to catch a\nlikeness. This error is at the root of the silly criticism that Mr. Shaw\nhas made it fashionable to print. In the plays of Shakespeare there are\ndetails of psychology and portraiture so realistic as to astonish and\nenchant the multitude, but the conception, the thing that Shakespeare\nset himself to realise, was not a faithful presentation of life. The\ncreation of Illusion was not the artistic problem that Shakespeare used\nas a channel for his artistic emotion and a focus for his energies. The\nworld of Shakespeare's plays is by no means so lifelike as the world of\nMr. Galsworthy's, and therefore those who imagine that the artistic\nproblem must always be the achieving of a correspondence between printed\nwords or painted forms and the world as they know it are right in\njudging the plays of Shakespeare inferior to those of Mr. Galsworthy. As\na matter of fact, the achievement of verisimilitude, far from being the\nonly possible problem, disputes with the achievement of beauty the\nhonour of being the worst possible. It is so easy to be lifelike, that\nan attempt to be nothing more will never bring into play the highest\nemotional and intellectual powers of the artist. Just as the aesthetic\nproblem is too vague, so the representative problem is too simple.\n\nEvery artist must choose his own problem. He may take it from wherever\nhe likes, provided he can make it the focus of those artistic emotions\nhe has got to express and the stimulant of those energies he will need\nto express them. What we have got to remember is that the problem--in a\npicture it is generally the subject--is of no consequence in itself. It\nis merely one of the artist's means of expression or creation. In any\nparticular case one problem may be better than another, as a means, just\nas one canvas or one brand of colours may be; that will depend upon the\ntemperament of the artist, and we may leave it to him. For us the\nproblem has no value; for the artist it is the working test of absolute\n\"rightness.\" It is the gauge that measures the pressure of steam; the\nartist stokes his fires to set the little handle spinning; he knows that\nhis machine will not move until he has got his pointer to the mark; he\nworks up to it and through it; but it does not drive the engine.\n\nWhat, then, is the conclusion of the whole matter? No more than this, I\nthink. The contemplation of pure form leads to a state of extraordinary\nexaltation and complete detachment from the concerns of life: of so\nmuch, speaking for myself, I am sure. It is tempting to suppose that the\nemotion which exalts has been transmitted through the forms we\ncontemplate by the artist who created them. If this be so, the\ntransmitted emotion, whatever it may be, must be of such a kind that it\ncan be expressed in any sort of form--in pictures, sculptures,\nbuildings, pots, textiles, &c., &c. Now the emotion that artists express\ncomes to some of them, so they tell us, from the apprehension of the\nformal significance of material things; and the formal significance of\nany material thing is the significance of that thing considered as an\nend in itself. But if an object considered as an end in itself moves us\nmore profoundly (_i.e._ has greater significance) than the same object\nconsidered as a means to practical ends or as a thing related to human\ninterests--and this undoubtedly is the case--we can only suppose that\nwhen we consider anything as an end in itself we become aware of that in\nit which is of greater moment than any qualities it may have acquired\nfrom keeping company with human beings. Instead of recognising its\naccidental and conditioned importance, we become aware of its essential\nreality, of the God in everything, of the universal in the particular,\nof the all-pervading rhythm. Call it by what name you will, the thing\nthat I am talking about is that which lies behind the appearance of all\nthings--that which gives to all things their individual significance,\nthe thing in itself, the ultimate reality. And if a more or less\nunconscious apprehension of this latent reality of material things be,\nindeed, the cause of that strange emotion, a passion to express which is\nthe inspiration of many artists, it seems reasonable to suppose that\nthose who, unaided by material objects, experience the same emotion have\ncome by another road to the same country.\n\nThat is the metaphysical hypothesis. Are we to swallow it whole, accept\na part of it, or reject it altogether? Each must decide for himself. I\ninsist only on the rightness of my aesthetic hypothesis. And of one\nother thing am I sure. Be they artists or lovers of art, mystics or\nmathematicians, those who achieve ecstasy are those who have freed\nthemselves from the arrogance of humanity. He who would feel the\nsignificance of art must make himself humble before it. Those who find\nthe chief importance of art or of philosophy in its relation to conduct\nor its practical utility--those who cannot value things as ends in\nthemselves or, at any rate, as direct means to emotion--will never get\nfrom anything the best that it can give. Whatever the world of aesthetic\ncontemplation may be, it is not the world of human business and\npassion; in it the chatter and tumult of material existence is unheard,\nor heard only as the echo of some more ultimate harmony.\n\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 1: The existence of the Ku K'ai-chih makes it clear that the\nart of this period (fifth to eighth centuries), was a typical primitive\nmovement. To call the great vital art of the Liang, Chen, Wei, and Tang\ndynasties a development out of the exquisitely refined and exhausted art\nof the Han decadence--from which Ku K'ai-chih is a delicate\nstraggler--is to call Romanesque sculpture a development out of\nPraxiteles. Between the two some thing has happened to refill the stream\nof art. What had happened in China was the spiritual and emotional\nrevolution that followed the onset of Buddhism.]\n\n[Footnote 2: This is not to say that exact representation is bad in\nitself. It is indifferent. A perfectly represented form may be\nsignificant, only it is fatal to sacrifice significance to\nrepresentation. The quarrel between significance and illusion seems to\nbe as old as art itself, and I have little doubt that what makes most\npalaeolithic art so bad is a preoccupation with exact representation.\nEvidently palaeolithic draughtsmen had no sense of the significance of\nform. Their art resembles that of the more capable and sincere Royal\nAcademicians: it is a little higher than that of Sir Edward Poynter and\na little lower than that of the late Lord Leighton. That this is no\nparadox let the cave-drawings of Altamira, or such works as the sketches\nof horses found at Bruniquel and now in the British Museum, bear\nwitness. If the ivory head of a girl from the Grotte du Pape,\nBrassempouy (_Musee St. Germain_) and the ivory torso found at the same\nplace (_Collection St. Cric_), be, indeed, palaeolithic, then there were\ngood palaeolithic artists who created and did not imitate form.\nNeolithic art is, of course, a very different matter.]\n\n[Footnote 3: Mr. Roger Fry permits me to make use of an interesting\nstory that will illustrate my view. When Mr. Okakura, the Government\neditor of _The Temple Treasures of Japan_, first came to Europe, he\nfound no difficulty in appreciating the pictures of those who from want\nof will or want of skill did not create illusions but concentrated their\nenergies on the creation of form. He understood immediately the\nByzantine masters and the French and Italian Primitives. In the\nRenaissance painters, on the other hand, with their descriptive\npre-occupations, their literary and anecdotic interests, he could see\nnothing but vulgarity and muddle. The universal and essential quality of\nart, significant form, was missing, or rather had dwindled to a shallow\nstream, overlaid and hidden beneath weeds, so the universal response,\naesthetic emotion, was not evoked. It was not till he came on to Henri\nMatisse that he again found himself in the familiar world of pure art.\nSimilarly, sensitive Europeans who respond immediately to the\nsignificant forms of great Oriental art, are left cold by the trivial\npieces of anecdote and social criticism so lovingly cherished by Chinese\ndilettanti. It would be easy to multiply instances did not decency\nforbid the labouring of so obvious a truth.]\n\n[Footnote 4: Anyone who has visited the very latest French exhibitions\nwill have seen scores of what are called \"Cubist\" pictures. These afford\nan excellent illustration of my thesis. Of a hundred cubist pictures\nthree or four will have artistic value. Thirty years ago the same might\nhave been said of \"Impressionist\" pictures; forty years before that of\nromantic pictures in the manner of Delacroix. The explanation is\nsimple,--the vast majority of those who paint pictures have neither\noriginality nor any considerable talent. Left to themselves they would\nprobably produce the kind of painful absurdity which in England is known\nas an \"Academy picture.\" But a student who has no original gift may yet\nbe anything but a fool, and many students understand that the ordinary\ncultivated picture-goer knows an \"Academy picture\" at a glance and knows\nthat it is bad. Is it fair to condemn severely a young painter for\ntrying to give his picture a factitious interest, or even for trying to\nconceal beneath striking wrappers the essential mediocrity of his wares?\nIf not heroically sincere he is surely not inhumanly base. Besides, he\nhas to imitate someone, and he likes to be in the fashion. And, after\nall, a bad cubist picture is no worse than any other bad picture. If\nanyone is to be blamed, it should be the spectator who cannot\ndistinguish between good cubist pictures and bad. Blame alike the fools\nwho think that because a picture is cubist it must be worthless, and\ntheir idiotic enemies who think it must be marvellous. People of\nsensibility can see that there is as much difference between Picasso and\na Montmartre sensationalist as there is between Ingres and the President\nof the Royal Academy.]\n\n\n\n\n               II\n\n           ART AND LIFE\n\n\n      I. ART AND RELIGION\n\n     II. ART AND HISTORY\n\n    III. ART AND ETHICS\n\n\n  [Illustration: EARLY PERUVIAN POT FROM THE NASCA VALLEY\n  _In the British Museum_]\n\n\n\n\nI\n\nART AND RELIGION\n\n\nIf in my first chapter I had been at pains to show that art owed nothing\nto life the title of my second would invite a charge of inconsistency.\nThe danger would be slight, however; for though art owed nothing to\nlife, life might well owe something to art. The weather is admirably\nindependent of human hopes and fears, yet few of us are so sublimely\ndetached as to be indifferent to the weather. Art does affect the lives\nof men; it moves to ecstasy, thus giving colour and moment to what might\nbe otherwise a rather grey and trivial affair. Art for some makes life\nworth living. Also, art is affected by life; for to create art there\nmust be men with hands and a sense of form and colour and\nthree-dimensional space and the power to feel and the passion to create.\nTherefore art has a great deal to do with life--with emotional life.\nThat it is a means to a state of exaltation is unanimously agreed, and\nthat it comes from the spiritual depths of man's nature is hardly\ncontested. The appreciation of art is certainly a means to ecstasy, and\nthe creation probably the expression of an ecstatic state of mind. Art\nis, in fact, a necessity to and a product of the spiritual life.\n\nThose who do not part company with me till the last stage of my\nmetaphysical excursion agree that the emotion expressed in a work of art\nsprings from the depths of man's spiritual nature; and those even who\nwill hear nothing of expression agree that the spiritual part is\nprofoundly affected by works of art. Art, therefore, has to do with the\nspiritual life, to which it gives and from which, I feel sure, it takes.\nIndirectly, art has something to do with practical life, too; for those\nemotional experiences must be very faint and contemptible that leave\nquite untouched our characters. Through its influence on character and\npoint of view art may affect practical life. But practical life and\nhuman sentiment can affect art only in so far as they can affect the\nconditions in which artists work. Thus they may affect the production of\nworks of art to some extent; to how great an extent I shall consider in\nanother place.\n\nAlso a great many works of visual art are concerned with life, or rather\nwith the physical universe of which life is a part, in that the men who\ncreated them were thrown into the creative mood by their surroundings.\nWe have observed, as we could hardly fail to do, that, whatever the\nemotion that artists express may be, it comes to many of them through\nthe contemplation of the familiar objects of life. The object of an\nartist's emotion seems to be more often than not either some particular\nscene or object, or a synthesis of his whole visual experience. Art may\nbe concerned with the physical universe, or with any part or parts of\nit, as a means to emotion--a means to that peculiar spiritual state that\nwe call inspiration. But the value of these parts as means to anything\nbut emotion art ignores--that is to say, it ignores their practical\nutility. Artists are often concerned with things, but never with the\nlabels on things. These useful labels were invented by practical people\nfor practical purposes. The misfortune is that, having acquired the\nhabit of recognising labels, practical people tend to lose the power of\nfeeling emotion; and, as the only way of getting at the thing in itself\nis by feeling its emotional significance, they soon begin to lose their\nsense of reality. Mr. Roger Fry has pointed out that few can hope ever\nto see a charging bull as an end in itself and yield themselves to the\nemotional significance of its forms, because no sooner is the label\n\"Charging Bull\" recognised than we begin to dispose ourselves for flight\nrather than contemplation.[5] This is where the habit of recognising\nlabels serves us well. It serves us ill, however, when, although there\nis no call for action or hurry, it comes between things and our\nemotional reaction to them. The label is nothing but a symbol that\nepitomises for busy humanity the significance of things regarded as\n\"means.\" A practical person goes into a room where there are chairs,\ntables, sofas, a hearth-rug and a mantel-piece. Of each he takes note\nintellectually, and if he wants to set himself down or set down a cup,\nhe will know all he needs to know for his purpose. The label tells him\njust those facts that serve his practical ends; of the thing itself that\nlurks behind the label nothing is said. Artists, _qua_ artists, are not\nconcerned with labels. They are concerned with things only as means to\na particular kind of emotion, which is the same as saying that they are\nonly concerned with things perceived as ends in themselves; for it is\nonly when things are _perceived_ as ends that they _become_ means to\nthis emotion. It is only when we cease to regard the objects in a\nlandscape as means to anything that we can feel the landscape\nartistically. But when we do succeed in regarding the parts of a\nlandscape as ends in themselves--as pure forms, that is to say--the\nlandscape becomes _ipso facto_ a means to a peculiar, aesthetic state of\nmind. Artists are concerned only with this peculiar emotional\nsignificance of the physical universe: because they _perceive_ things as\n\"ends,\" things _become_ for them \"means\" to ecstasy.\n\nThe habit of recognising the label and overlooking the thing, of seeing\nintellectually instead of seeing emotionally, accounts for the amazing\nblindness, or rather visual shallowness, of most civilised adults. We do\nnot forget what has moved us, but what we have merely recognised leaves\nno deep impression on the mind. A friend of mine, a man of taste,\ndesired to make some clearance in his gardens, encumbered as they were\nwith a multitude of trees; unfortunately most of his friends and all his\nfamily objected on sentimental or aesthetic grounds, declaring that the\nplace would never be the same to them if the axe were laid to a single\ntrunk. My friend was in despair, until, one day, I suggested to him that\nwhenever his people were all away on visits or travels, as was pretty\noften the case, he should have as many trees cut down as could be\ncompletely and cleanly removed during their absence. Since then, several\nhundreds have been carted from his small park and pleasure grounds, and\nshould the secret be betrayed to the family I am cheerfully confident\nthat not one of them would believe it. I could cite innumerable\ninstances of this insensibility to form. How often have I been one of a\nparty in a room with which all were familiar, the decoration of which\nhad lately been changed, and I the only one to notice it. For practical\npurposes the room remained unaltered; only its emotional significance\nwas new. Question your friend as to the disposition of the furniture in\nhis wife's drawing-room; ask him to sketch the street down which he\npasses daily; ten to one he goes hopelessly astray. Only artists and\neducated people of extraordinary sensibility and some savages and\nchildren feel the significance of form so acutely that they know how\nthings look. These see, because they see emotionally; and no one forgets\nthe things that have moved him. Those forget who have never felt the\nemotional significance of pure form; they are not stupid nor are they\ngenerally insensitive, but they use their eyes only to collect\ninformation, not to capture emotion. This habit of using the eyes\nexclusively to pick up facts is the barrier that stands between most\npeople and an understanding of visual art. It is not a barrier that has\nstood unbreached always, nor need it stand so for all future time.\n\nIn ages of great spiritual exaltation the barrier crumbles and becomes,\nin places, less insuperable. Such ages are commonly called great\nreligious ages: nor is the name ill-chosen. For, more often than not,\nreligion is the whetstone on which men sharpen the spiritual sense.\nReligion, like art, is concerned with the world of emotional reality,\nand with material things only in so far as they are emotionally\nsignificant. For the mystic, as for the artist, the physical universe is\na means to ecstasy. The mystic feels things as \"ends\" instead of seeing\nthem as \"means.\" He seeks within all things that ultimate reality which\nprovokes emotional exaltation; and, if he does not come at it through\npure form, there are, as I have said, more roads than one to that\ncountry. Religion, as I understand it, is an expression of the\nindividual's sense of the emotional significance of the universe; I\nshould not be surprised to find that art was an expression of the same\nthing. Anyway, both seem to express emotions different from and\ntranscending the emotions of life. Certainly both have the power of\ntransporting men to superhuman ecstasies; both are means to unearthly\nstates of mind. Art and religion belong to the same world. Both are\nbodies in which men try to capture and keep alive their shyest and most\nethereal conceptions. The kingdom of neither is of this world. Rightly,\ntherefore, do we regard art and religion as twin manifestations of the\nspirit; wrongly do some speak of art as a manifestation of religion.\n\nIf it were said that art and religion were twin manifestations of\nsomething that, for convenience sake, may be called \"the religious\nspirit,\" I should make no serious complaint. But I should insist on the\ndistinction between \"religion,\" in the ordinary acceptation of the word,\nand \"the religious spirit\" being stated beyond all possibility of cavil.\nI should insist that if we are to say that art is a manifestation of the\nreligious spirit, we must say the same of every respectable religion\nthat ever has existed or ever can exist. Above all, I should insist that\nwhoever said it should bear in mind, whenever he said it, that\n\"manifestation\" is at least as different from \"expression\" as Monmouth\nis from Macedon.\n\nThe religious spirit is born of a conviction that some things matter\nmore than others. To those possessed by it there is a sharp distinction\nbetween that which is unconditioned and universal and that which is\nlimited and local. It is a consciousness of the unconditioned and\nuniversal that makes people religious; and it is this consciousness or,\nat least, a conviction that some things are unconditioned and universal,\nthat makes their attitude towards the conditioned and local sometimes a\nlittle unsympathetic. It is this consciousness that makes them set\njustice above law, passion above principle, sensibility above culture,\nintelligence above knowledge, intuition above experience, the ideal\nabove the tolerable. It is this consciousness that makes them the\nenemies of convention, compromise, and common-sense. In fact, the\nessence of religion is a conviction that because some things are of\ninfinite value most are profoundly unimportant, that since the\ngingerbread is there one need not feel too strongly about the gilt.\n\nIt is useless for liberal divines to pretend that there is no antagonism\nbetween the religious nature and the scientific. There is no antagonism\nbetween religion and science, but that is a very different matter. In\nfact, the hypotheses of science begin only where religion ends: but both\nreligion and science are born trespassers. The religious and the\nscientific both have their prejudices; but their prejudices are not the\nsame. The scientific mind cannot free itself from a prejudice against\nthe notion that effects may exist the causes of which it ignores. Not\nonly do religious minds manage to believe that there may be effects of\nwhich they do not know, and may never know, the causes--they cannot even\nsee the absolute necessity for supposing that everything is caused.\nScientific people tend to trust their senses and disbelieve their\nemotions when they contradict them; religious people tend to trust\nemotion even though sensual experience be against it. On the whole, the\nreligious are the more open-minded. Their assumption that the senses may\nmislead is less arrogant than the assumption that through them alone can\nwe come at reality, for, as Dr. McTaggart has wittily said, \"If a man is\nshut up in a house, the transparency of the windows is an essential\ncondition of his seeing the sky. But it would not be prudent to infer\nthat, if he walked out of the house, he could not see the sky, because\nthere was no longer any glass through which he might see it.\"[6]\n\nExamples of scientific bigotry are as common as blackberries. The\nattitude of the profession towards unorthodox medicine is the classical\ninstance. In the autumn of 1912 I was walking through the Grafton\nGalleries with a man who is certainly one of the ablest, and is reputed\none of the most enlightened, of contemporary men of science. Looking at\nthe picture of a young girl with a cat by Henri-Matisse, he\nexclaimed--\"I see how it is, the fellow's astigmatic.\" I should have let\nthis bit of persiflage go unanswered, assuming it to be one of those\nwitty sallies for which the princes of science are so justly famed and\nto which they often treat us even when they are not in the presence of\nworks of art, had not the professor followed up his clue with the utmost\ngravity, assuring me at last that no picture in the gallery was beyond\nthe reach of optical diagnostic. Still suspicious of his good faith, I\nsuggested, tentatively, that perhaps the discrepancies between the\nnormal man's vision and the pictures on the wall were the result of\nintentional distortion on the part of the artists. At this the professor\nbecame passionately serious--\"Do you mean to tell me,\" he bawled, \"that\nthere has ever been a painter who did not try to make his objects as\nlifelike as possible? Dismiss such silly nonsense from your head.\" It is\nthe old story: \"Clear your mind of cant,\" that is to say, of anything\nwhich appears improbable or unpalatable to Dr. Johnson.\n\nThe religious, on the other hand, are apt to be a little prejudiced\nagainst common-sense; and, for my own part, I confess that I am often\ntempted to think that a common-sense view is necessarily a wrong one. It\nwas common-sense to see that the world must be flat and that the sun\nmust go round it; only when those fantastical people made themselves\nheard who thought that the solar system could not be quite so simple an\naffair as common-sense knew it must be were these opinions knocked on\nthe head. Dr. Johnson, the great exemplar of British common-sense,\nobserving in autumn the gathered swallows skimming over pools and\nrivers, pronounced it certain that these birds sleep all the winter--\"A\nnumber of them conglobulate together, by flying round and round, and\nthen all in a heap throw themselves under water, and lie in the bed of a\nriver\": how sensibly, too, did he dispose of Berkeley's\nIdealism--\"striking his foot with mighty force against a large\nstone\"--\"I refute it thus.\" Seriously, is the common-sense view ever the\nright one?\n\nLately, the men of sense and science have secured allies who have\nbrought to their cause what most it lacked, a little fundamental\nthought. Those able and honest people, the Cambridge rationalists,\nheaded by Mr. G.E. Moore, to whose _Principia Ethica_ I owe so much,\nare, of course, profoundly religious and live by a passionate faith in\nthe absolute value of certain states of mind; also they have fallen in\nlove with the conclusions and methods of science. Being extremely\nintelligent, they perceive, however, that empirical arguments can avail\nnothing for or against a metaphysical theory, and that ultimately all\nthe conclusions of science are based on a logic that precedes\nexperience. Also they perceive that emotions are just as real as\nsensations. They find themselves confronted, therefore, by this\ndifficulty; if someone steps forward to say that he has a direct,\ndisinterested, _a priori_, conviction of the goodness of his emotions\ntowards the Mass, he puts himself in the same position as Mr. Moore, who\nfeels a similar conviction about the goodness of his towards the Truth.\nIf Mr. Moore is to infer the goodness of one state of mind from his\nfeelings, why should not someone else infer the goodness of another from\nhis? The Cambridge rationalists have a short way with such dissenters.\nThey simply assure them that they do not feel what they say they feel.\nSome of them have begun to apply their cogent methods to aesthetics; and\nwhen we tell them what we feel for pure form they assure us that, in\nfact, we feel nothing of the sort. This argument, however, has always\nstruck me as lacking in subtlety.\n\nMuch as he dislikes mentioning the fact or hearing it mentioned, the\ncommon man of science recognises no other end in life than protracted\nand agreeable existence. That is where he joins issue with the\nreligious; it is also his excuse for being a eugenist. He declines to\nbelieve in any reality other than that of the physical universe. On that\nreality he insists dogmatically.[7] Man, he says, is an animal who, like\nother animals, desires to live; he is provided with senses, and these,\nlike other animals, he seeks to gratify: in these facts he bids us find\nan explanation of all human aspiration. Man wants to live and he wants\nto have a good time; to compass these ends he has devised an elaborate\nmachinery. All emotion, says the common man of science, must ultimately\nbe traced to the senses. All moral, religious and aesthetic emotions are\nderived from physical needs, just as political ideas are based on that\ngregarious instinct which is simply the result of a desire to live long\nand to live in comfort. We obey the by-law that forbids us to ride a\nbicycle on the footpath, because we see that, in the long run, such a\nlaw is conducive to continued and agreeable existence, and for very\nsimilar reasons, says the man of science, we approve of magnanimous\ncharacters and sublime works of art.\n\n\"Not so,\" reply saints, artists, Cambridge rationalists, and all the\nbetter sort; for they feel that their religious, aesthetic, or moral\nemotions are not conditioned, directly or indirectly, by physical needs,\nnor, indeed, by anything in the physical universe. Some things, they\nfeel, are good, not because they are means to physical well-being, but\nbecause they are good in themselves. In nowise does the value of\naesthetic or religious rapture depend upon the physical satisfaction it\naffords. There are things in life the worth of which cannot be related\nto the physical universe,--things of which the worth is not relative but\nabsolute. Of these matters I speak cautiously and without authority: for\nmy immediate purpose--to present my conception of the religious\ncharacter--I need say only that to some the materialistic conception of\nthe universe does not seem to explain those emotions which they feel\nwith supreme certainty and absolute disinterestedness. The fact is, men\nof science, having got us into the habit of attempting to justify all\nour feelings and states of mind by reference to the physical universe,\nhave almost bullied some of us into believing that what cannot be so\njustified does not exist.\n\nI call him a religious man who, feeling with conviction that some things\nare good in themselves, and that physical existence is not amongst them,\npursues, at the expense of physical existence, that which appears to him\ngood. All those who hold with uncompromising sincerity that spiritual is\nmore important than material life, are, in my sense, religious. For\ninstance, in Paris I have seen young painters, penniless, half-fed,\nunwarmed, ill-clothed, their women and children in no better case,\nworking all day in feverish ecstasy at unsaleable pictures, and quite\npossibly they would have killed or wounded anyone who suggested a\ncompromise with the market. When materials and credit failed altogether,\nthey stole newspapers and boot-blacking that they might continue to\nserve their masterful passion. They were superbly religious. All artists\nare religious. All uncompromising belief is religious. A man who so\ncares for truth that he will go to prison, or death, rather than\nacknowledge a God in whose existence he does not believe, is as\nreligious, and as much a martyr in the cause of religion, as Socrates\nor Jesus. He has set his criterion of values outside the physical\nuniverse.\n\nIn material things, half a loaf is said to be better than no bread. Not\nso in spiritual. If he thinks that it may do some good, a politician\nwill support a bill which he considers inadequate. He states his\nobjections and votes with the majority. He does well, perhaps. In\nspiritual matters such compromises are impossible. To please the public\nthe artist cannot give of his second best. To do so would be to\nsacrifice that which makes life valuable. Were he to become a liar and\nexpress something different from what he feels, truth would no longer be\nin him. What would it profit him to gain the whole world and lose his\nown soul? He knows that there is that within him which is more important\nthan physical existence--that to which physical existence is but a\nmeans. That he may feel and express it, it is good that he should be\nalive. But unless he may feel and express the best, he were better dead.\n\nArt and Religion are, then, two roads by which men escape from\ncircumstance to ecstasy. Between aesthetic and religious rapture there\nis a family alliance. Art and Religion are means to similar states of\nmind. And if we are licensed to lay aside the science of aesthetics and,\ngoing behind our emotion and its object, consider what is in the mind of\nthe artist, we may say, loosely enough, that art is a manifestation of\nthe religious sense. If it be an expression of emotion--as I am\npersuaded that it is--it is an expression of that emotion which is the\nvital force in every religion, or, at any rate, it expresses an emotion\nfelt for that which is the essence of all. We may say that both art and\nreligion are manifestations of man's religious sense, if by \"man's\nreligious sense\" we mean his sense of ultimate reality. What we may not\nsay is, that art is the expression of any particular religion; for to do\nso is to confuse the religious spirit with the channels in which it has\nbeen made to flow. It is to confuse the wine with the bottle. Art may\nhave much to do with that universal emotion that has found a corrupt and\nstuttering expression in a thousand different creeds: it has nothing to\ndo with historical facts or metaphysical fancies. To be sure, many\ndescriptive paintings are manifestos and expositions of religious\ndogmas: a very proper use for descriptive painting too. Certainly the\nblot on many good pictures is the descriptive element introduced for\nthe sake of edification and instruction. But in so far as a picture is a\nwork of art, it has no more to do with dogmas or doctrines, facts or\ntheories, than with the interests and emotions of daily life.\n\n\n\n\nII\n\nART AND HISTORY\n\n\nAnd yet there is a connection between art and religion, even in the\ncommon and limited sense of that word. There is an historical\nXXXXXXXXXX: XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX\nbetween the history of art and the history of religion. Religions are\nvital and sincere only so long as they are animated by that which\nanimates all great art--spiritual ferment. It is a mistake, by the way,\nto suppose that dogmatic religion cannot be vital and sincere. Religious\nemotions tend always to anchor themselves to earth by a chain of dogma.\nThat tendency is the enemy within the gate of every movement. Dogmatic\nreligion can be vital and sincere, and what is more, theology and ritual\nhave before now been the trumpet and drum of spiritual revolutions. But\ndogmatic or intellectually free, religious ages, ages of spiritual\nturmoil, ages in which men set the spirit above the flesh and the\nemotions above the intellect, are the ages in which is felt the\nemotional significance of the universe. Then it is men live on the\nfrontiers of reality and listen eagerly to travellers' tales. Thus it\ncomes about that the great ages of religion are commonly the great ages\nof art. As the sense of reality grows dim, as men become more handy at\nmanipulating labels and symbols, more mechanical, more disciplined, more\nspecialised, less capable of feeling things directly, the power of\nescaping to the world of ecstasy decays, and art and religion begin to\nsink. When the majority lack, not only the emotion out of which art and\nreligion are made, but even the sensibility to respond to what the few\ncan still offer, art and religion founder. After that, nothing is left\nof art and religion but their names; illusion and prettiness are called\nart, politics and sentimentality religion.\n\nNow, if I am right in thinking that art is a manifestation--a\nmanifestation, mark, and not an expression--of man's spiritual state,\nthen in the history of art we shall read the spiritual history of the\nrace. I am not surprised that those who have devoted their lives to the\nstudy of history should take it ill when one who professes only to\nunderstand the nature of art hints that by understanding his own\nbusiness he may become a judge of theirs. Let me be as conciliatory as\npossible. No one can have less right than I, or, indeed, less\ninclination to assume the proud title of \"scientific historian\": no one\ncan care less about historical small-talk or be more at a loss to\nunderstand what precisely is meant by \"historical science.\" Yet if\nhistory be anything more than a chronological catalogue of facts, if it\nbe concerned with the movements of mind and spirit, then I submit that\nto read history aright we must know, not only the works of art that each\nage produced, but also their value as works of art. If the aesthetic\nsignificance or insignificance of works of art does, indeed, bear\nwitness to a spiritual state, then he who can appreciate that\nsignificance should be in a position to form some opinion concerning the\nspiritual state of the men who produced those works and of those who\nappreciated them. If art be at all the sort of thing it is commonly\nsupposed to be, the history of art must be an index to the spiritual\nhistory of the race. Only, the historian who wishes to use art as an\nindex must possess not merely the nice observation of the scholar and\nthe archaeologist, but also a fine sensibility. For it is the aesthetic\nsignificance of a work that gives a clue to the state of mind that\nproduced it; so the ability to assign a particular work to a particular\nperiod avails nothing unaccompanied by the power of appreciating its\naesthetic significance.\n\nTo understand completely the history of an age must we know and\nunderstand the history of its art? It seems so. And yet the idea is\nintolerable to scientific historians. What becomes of the great\nscientific principle of water-tight compartments? Again, it is unjust:\nfor assuredly, to understand art we need know nothing whatever about\nhistory. It may be that from works of art we can draw inferences as to\nthe sort of people who made them: but the longest and most intimate\nconversations with an artist will not tell us whether his pictures are\ngood or bad. We must see them: then we shall know. I may be partial or\ndishonest about the work of my friend, but its aesthetic significance is\nnot more obvious to me than that of a work that was finished five\nthousand years ago. To appreciate fully a work of art we require nothing\nbut sensibility. To those that can hear Art speaks for itself: facts and\ndates do not; to make bricks of such stuff one must glean the uplands\nand hollows for tags of auxiliary information and suggestion; and the\nhistory of art is no exception to the rule. To appreciate a man's art I\nneed know nothing whatever about the artist; I can say whether this\npicture is better than that without the help of history; but if I am\ntrying to account for the deterioration of his art, I shall be helped by\nknowing that he has been seriously ill or that he has married a wife who\ninsists on his boiling her pot. To mark the deterioration was to make a\npure, aesthetic judgment: to account for it was to become an historian.\nTo understand the history of art we must know something of other kinds\nof history. Perhaps, to understand thoroughly any kind of history we\nmust understand every kind of history. Perhaps the history of an age or\nof a life is an indivisible whole. Another intolerable idea! What\nbecomes of the specialist? What of those formidable compendiums in which\nthe multitudinous activities of man are kept so jealously apart? The\nmind boggles at the monstrous vision of its own conclusions.\n\nBut, after all, does it matter to me? I am not an historian of art or of\nanything else. I care very little when things were made, or why they\nwere made; I care about their emotional significance to us. To the\nhistorian everything is a means to some other means; to me everything\nthat matters is a direct means to emotion. I am writing about art, not\nabout history. With history I am concerned only in so far as history\nserves to illustrate my hypothesis: and whether history be true or false\nmatters very little, since my hypothesis is not based on history but on\npersonal experience, not on facts but on feelings. Historical fact and\nfalsehood are of no consequence to people who try to deal with\nrealities. They need not ask, \"Did this happen?\"; they need ask only,\n\"Do I feel this?\" Lucky for us that it is so: for if our judgments about\nreal things had to wait upon historical certitude they might have to\nwait for ever. Nevertheless it is amusing to see how far that of which\nwe are sure agrees with that which we should expect. My aesthetic\nhypothesis--that the essential quality in a work of art is significant\nform--was based on my aesthetic experience. Of my aesthetic experiences\nI am sure. About my second hypothesis, that significant form is the\nexpression of a peculiar emotion felt for reality--I am far from\nconfident. However, I assume it to be true, and go on to suggest that\nthis sense of reality leads men to attach greater importance to the\nspiritual than to the material significance of the universe, that it\ndisposes men to feel things as ends instead of merely recognising them\nas means, that a sense of reality is, in fact, the essence of spiritual\nhealth. If this be so, we shall expect to find that ages in which the\ncreation of significant form is checked are ages in which the sense of\nreality is dim, and that these ages are ages of spiritual poverty. We\nshall expect to find the curves of art and spiritual fervour ascending\nand descending together. In my next chapter I shall glance at the\nhistory of a cycle of art with the intention of following the movement\nof art and discovering how far that movement keeps pace with changes in\nthe spiritual state of society. My view of the rise, decline and fall of\nart in Christendom is based entirely on a series of independent\naesthetic judgments in the rightness of which I have the arrogance to\nfeel considerable confidence. I pretend to a power of distinguishing\nbetween significant and insignificant form, and it will interest me to\nsee whether a decline in the significance of forms--a deterioration of\nart, that is to say--synchronises generally with a lowering of the\nreligious sense. I shall expect to find that whenever artists have\nallowed themselves to be seduced from their proper business, the\ncreation of form, by other and irrelevant interests, society has been\nspiritually decadent. Ages in which the sense of formal significance has\nbeen swamped utterly by preoccupation with the obvious, will turn out, I\nsuspect, to have been ages of spiritual famine. Therefore, while\nfollowing the fortunes of art across a period of fourteen hundred years,\nI shall try to keep an eye on that of which art may be a\nmanifestation--man's sense of ultimate reality.\n\nTo criticise a work of art historically is to play the science-besotted\nfool. No more disastrous theory ever issued from the brain of a\ncharlatan than that of evolution in art. Giotto did not creep, a grub,\nthat Titian might flaunt, a butterfly. To think of a man's art as\nleading on to the art of someone else is to misunderstand it. To praise\nor abuse or be interested in a work of art because it leads or does not\nlead to another work of art is to treat it as though it were not a work\nof art. The connection of one work of art with another may have\neverything to do with history: it has nothing to do with appreciation.\nSo soon as we begin to consider a work as anything else than an end in\nitself we leave the world of art. Though the development of painting\nfrom Giotto to Titian may be interesting historically, it cannot affect\nthe value of any particular picture: aesthetically, it is of no\nconsequence whatever. Every work of art must be judged on its own\nmerits.\n\nTherefore, be sure that, in my next chapter, I am not going to make\naesthetic judgments in the light of history; I am going to read history\nin the light of aesthetic judgments. Having made my judgments,\nindependently of any theory, aesthetic or non-aesthetic, I shall be\namused to see how far the view of history that may be based on them\nagrees with accepted historical hypotheses. If my judgments and the\ndates furnished by historians be correct, it will follow that some ages\nhave produced more good art than others: but, indeed, it is not disputed\nthat the variety in the artistic significance of different ages is\nimmense. I shall be curious to see what relation can be established\nbetween the art and the age that produced it. If my second\nhypothesis--that art is the expression of an emotion for ultimate\nreality--be correct, the relation between art and its age will be\ninevitable and intimate. In that case, an aesthetic judgment will imply\nsome sort of judgment about the general state of mind of the artist and\nhis admirers. In fact, anyone who accepts absolutely my second\nhypothesis with all its possible implications--which is more than I am\nwilling to do--will not only see in the history of art the spiritual\nhistory of the race, but will be quite unable to think of one without\nthinking of the other.\n\nIf I do not go quite so far as that, I stop short only by a little.\nCertainly it is less absurd to see in art the key to history than to\nimagine that history can help us to an appreciation of art. In ages of\nspiritual fervour I look for great art. By ages of spiritual fervour I\ndo not mean pleasant or romantic or humane or enlightened ages; I mean\nages in which, for one reason or another, men have been unusually\nexcited about their souls and unusually indifferent about their bodies.\nSuch ages, as often as not, have been superstitious and cruel.\nPreoccupation with the soul may lead to superstition, indifference about\nthe body to cruelty. I never said that ages of great art were\nsympathetic to the middle-classes. Art and a quiet life are incompatible\nI think; some stress and turmoil there must be. Need I add that in the\nsnuggest age of materialism great artists may arise and flourish? Of\ncourse: but when the production of good art is at all widespread and\ncontinuous, near at hand I shall expect to find a restless generation.\nAlso, having marked a period of spiritual stir, I shall look, not far\noff, for its manifestation in significant form. But the stir must be\nspiritual and genuine; a swirl of emotionalism or political frenzy will\nprovoke nothing fine.[8] How far in any particular age the production of\nart is stimulated by general exaltation, or general exaltation by works\nof art, is a question hardly to be decided. Wisest, perhaps, is he who\nsays that the two seem to have been interdependent. Just how dependent I\nbelieve them to have been, will appear when, in my next chapter, I\nattempt to sketch the rise, decline, and fall of the Christian slope.\n\n\n\n\nIII\n\nART AND ETHICS\n\n\nBetween me and the pleasant places of history remains, however, one ugly\nbarrier. I cannot dabble and paddle in the pools and shallows of the\npast until I have answered a question so absurd that the nicest people\nnever tire of asking it: \"What is the moral justification of art?\" Of\ncourse they are right who insist that the creation of art must be\njustified on ethical grounds: all human activities must be so justified.\nIt is the philosopher's privilege to call upon the artist to show that\nwhat he is about is either good in itself or a means to good. It is the\nartist's duty to reply: \"Art is good because it exalts to a state of\necstasy better far than anything a benumbed moralist can even guess at;\nso shut up.\" Philosophically he is quite right; only, philosophy is not\nso simple as that. Let us try to answer philosophically.\n\nThe moralist inquires whether art is either good in itself or a means\nto good. Before answering, we will ask what he means by the word \"good,\"\nnot because it is in the least doubtful, but to make him think. In fact,\nMr. G.E. Moore has shown pretty conclusively in his _Principia Ethica_\nthat by \"good\" everyone means just good. We all know quite well what we\nmean though we cannot define it. \"Good\" can no more be defined than\n\"Red\": no quality can be defined. Nevertheless we know perfectly well\nwhat we mean when we say that a thing is \"good\" or \"red.\" This is so\nobviously true that its statement has greatly disconcerted, not to say\nenraged, the orthodox philosophers.\n\nOrthodox philosophers are by no means agreed as to what we do mean by\n\"good,\" only they are sure that we cannot mean what we say. They used to\nbe fond of assuming that \"good\" meant pleasure; or, at any rate, that\npleasure was the sole good as an end: two very different propositions.\nThat \"good\" means \"pleasure\" and that pleasure is the sole good was the\nopinion of the Hedonists, and is still the opinion of any Utilitarians\nwho may have lingered on into the twentieth century. They enjoy the\nhonour of being the only ethical fallacies worth the powder and shot of\na writer on art. I can imagine no more delicate or convincing piece of\nlogic than that by which Mr. G.E. Moore disposes of both. But it is none\nof my business to do clumsily what Mr. Moore has done exquisitely. I\nhave no mind by attempting to reproduce his dialectic to incur the\nmerited ridicule of those familiar with the _Principia Ethica_ or to\nspoil the pleasure of those who will be wise enough to run out this very\nminute and order a masterpiece with which they happen to be\nunacquainted. For my immediate purpose it is necessary only to borrow\none shaft from that well-stocked armoury.\n\nTo him who believes that pleasure is the sole good, I will put this\nquestion: Does he, like John Stuart Mill, and everyone else I ever heard\nof, speak of \"higher and lower\" or \"better and worse\" or \"superior and\ninferior\" pleasures? And, if so, does he not perceive that he has given\naway his case? For, when he says that one pleasure is \"higher\" or\n\"better\" than another, he does not mean that it is greater in _quantity_\nbut superior in _quality_.\n\nOn page 7 of _Utilitarianism_, J.S. Mill says:--\n\n     \"If one of the two (pleasures) is, by those who are competently\n     acquainted with both, placed so far above the other that they\n     prefer it, even though knowing it to be attended with a greater\n     amount of discontent, and would not resign it for any quantity of\n     the other pleasure which their nature is capable of, we are\n     justified in ascribing to the preferred enjoyment a superiority in\n     quality, so far outweighing quantity as to render it, in\n     comparison, of small account.\"\n\nBut if pleasure be the sole good, the only possible criterion of\npleasures is quantity of pleasure. \"Higher\" or \"better\" can only mean\ncontaining more pleasure. To speak of \"better pleasures\" in any other\nsense is to make the goodness of the sole good as an end depend upon\nsomething which, _ex hypothesi_, is not good as an end. Mill is as one\nwho, having set up sweetness as the sole good quality in jam, prefers\nTiptree to Crosse and Blackwell, not because it is sweeter, but because\nit possesses a better kind of sweetness. To do so is to discard\nsweetness as an ultimate criterion and to set up something else in its\nplace. So, when Mill, like everyone else, speaks of \"better\" or\n\"higher\" or \"superior\" pleasures, he discards pleasure as an ultimate\ncriterion, and thereby admits that pleasure is not the sole good. He\nfeels that some pleasures are better than others, and determines their\nrespective values by the degree in which they possess that quality which\nall recognise but none can define--goodness. By higher and lower,\nsuperior and inferior pleasures we mean simply more good and less good\npleasures. There are, therefore, two different qualities, Pleasantness\nand Goodness. Pleasure, amongst other things, may be good; but pleasure\ncannot mean good. By \"good\" we cannot mean \"pleasureable;\" for, as we\nsee, there is a quality, \"goodness,\" so distinct from pleasure that we\nspeak of pleasures that are more or less good without meaning pleasures\nthat are more or less pleasant. By \"good,\" then, we do not mean\n\"pleasure,\" neither is pleasure the sole good.\n\nMr. Moore goes on to inquire what things are good in themselves, as ends\nthat is to say. He comes to a conclusion with which we all agree, but\nfor which few could have found convincing and logical arguments: \"states\nof mind,\" he shows, alone are good as ends.[9] People who have very\nlittle taste for logic will find a simple and satisfactory proof of this\nconclusion afforded by what is called \"the method of isolation.\"\n\nThat which is good as an end will retain some, at any rate, of its value\nin complete isolation: it will retain all its value as an end. That\nwhich is good as a means only will lose all its value in isolation. That\nwhich is good as an end will remain valuable even when deprived of all\nits consequences and left with nothing but bare existence. Therefore, we\ncan discover whether honestly we feel some thing to be good as an end,\nif only we can conceive it in complete isolation, and be sure that so\nisolated it remains valuable. Bread is good. Is bread good as an end or\nas a means? Conceive a loaf existing in an uninhabited and uninhabitable\nplanet. Does it seem to lose its value? That is a little too easy. The\nphysical universe appears to most people immensely good, for towards\nnature they feel violently that emotional reaction which brings to the\nlips the epithet \"good\"; but if the physical universe were not related\nto mind, if it were never to provoke an emotional reaction, if no mind\nwere ever to be affected by it, and if it had no mind of its own, would\nit still appear good? There are two stars: one is, and ever will be,\nvoid of life, on the other exists a fragment of just living protoplasm\nwhich will never develop, will never become conscious. Can we say\nhonestly that we feel one to be better than the other? Is life itself\ngood as an end? A clear judgment is made difficult by the fact that one\ncannot conceive anything without feeling something for it; one's very\nconceptions provoke states of mind and thus acquire value as means. Let\nus ask ourselves, bluntly, can that which has no mind and affects no\nmind have value? Surely not. But anything which has a mind can have\nintrinsic value, and anything that affects a mind may become valuable as\na means, since the state of mind produced may be valuable in itself.\nIsolate that mind. Isolate the state of mind of a man in love or rapt in\ncontemplation; it does not seem to lose all its value. I do not say that\nits value is not decreased; obviously, it loses its value as a means to\nproducing good states of mind in others. But a certain value does\nsubsist--an intrinsic value. Populate the lone star with one human mind\nand every part of that star becomes potentially valuable as a means,\nbecause it may be a means to that which is good as an end--a good state\nof mind. The state of mind of a person in love or rapt in contemplation\nsuffices in itself. We do not stay to inquire \"What useful purpose does\nthis serve, whom does it benefit, and how?\" We say directly and with\nconviction--\"This is good.\"\n\nWhen we are challenged to justify our opinion that anything, other than\na state of mind, is good, we, feeling it to be a means only, do very\nproperly seek its good effects, and our last justification is always\nthat it produces good states of mind. Thus, when asked why we call a\npatent fertiliser good, we may, if we can find a listener, show that the\nfertiliser is a means to good crops, good crops a means to food, food a\nmeans to life, and life a necessary condition of good states of mind.\nFurther we cannot go. When asked why we hold a particular state of mind\nto be good, the state of aesthetic contemplation for instance, we can\nbut reply that to us its goodness is self-evident. Some states of mind\nappear to be good independently of their consequences. No other things\nappear to be good in this way. We conclude, therefore, that good states\nof mind are alone good as ends.\n\nTo justify ethically any human activity, we must inquire--\"Is this a\nmeans to good states of mind?\" In the case of art our answer will be\nprompt and emphatic. Art is not only a means to good states of mind,\nbut, perhaps, the most direct and potent that we possess. Nothing is\nmore direct, because nothing affects the mind more immediately; nothing\nis more potent, because there is no state of mind more excellent or more\nintense than the state of aesthetic contemplation. This being so, to\nseek any other moral justification for art, to seek in art a means to\nanything less than good states of mind, is an act of wrong-headedness to\nbe committed only by a fool or a man of genius.\n\nMany fools have committed it and one man of genius has made it\nnotorious. Never was cart put more obstructively before horse than when\nTolstoi announced that the justification of art was its power of\npromoting good actions. As if actions were ends in themselves! There is\nneither virtue nor vice in running: but to run with good tidings is\ncommendable, to run away with an old lady's purse is not. There is no\nmerit in shouting: but to speak up for truth and justice is well, to\ndeafen the world with charlatanry is damnable. Always it is the end in\nview that gives value to action; and, ultimately, the end of all good\nactions must be to create or encourage or make possible good states of\nmind. Therefore, inciting people to good actions by means of edifying\nimages is a respectable trade and a roundabout means to good. Creating\nworks of art is as direct a means to good as a human being can practise.\nJust in this fact lies the tremendous importance of art: there is no\nmore direct means to good.\n\nTo pronounce anything a work of art is, therefore, to make a momentous\nmoral judgment. It is to credit an object with being so direct and\npowerful a means to good that we need not trouble ourselves about any\nother of its possible consequences. But even were this not the case, the\nhabit of introducing moral considerations into judgments between\nparticular works of art would be inexcusable. Let the moralist make a\njudgment about art as a whole, let him assign it what he considers its\nproper place amongst means to good, but in aesthetic judgments, in\njudgments between members of the same class, in judgments between works\nof art considered as art, let him hold his tongue. If he esteem art\nanything less than equal to the greatest means to good he mistakes. But\ngranting, for the sake of peace, its inferiority to some, I will yet\nremind him that his moral judgments about the value of particular works\nof art have nothing to do with their artistic value. The judge at Epsom\nis not permitted to disqualify the winner of the Derby in favour of the\nhorse that finished last but one on the ground that the latter is just\nthe animal for the Archbishop of Canterbury's brougham.\n\nDefine art as you please, preferably in accordance with my ideas; assign\nit what place you will in the moral system; and then discriminate\nbetween works of art according to their excellence in that quality, or\nthose qualities, that you have laid down in your definition as essential\nand peculiar to works of art. You may, of course, make ethical judgments\nabout particular works, not as works of art, but as members of some\nother class, or as independent and unclassified parts of the universe.\nYou may hold that a particular picture by the President of the Royal\nAcademy is a greater means to good than one by the glory of the New\nEnglish Art Club, and that a penny bun is better than either. In such a\ncase you will be making a moral and not an aesthetic judgment. Therefore\nit will be right to take into account the area of the canvases, the\nthickness of the frames, and the potential value of each as fuel or\nshelter against the rigours of our climate. In casting up accounts you\nshould not neglect their possible effects on the middle-aged people who\nvisit Burlington House and the Suffolk Street Gallery; nor must you\nforget the consciences of those who handle the Chantry funds, or of\nthose whom high prices provoke to emulation. You will be making a moral\nand not an aesthetic judgment; and if you have concluded that neither\npicture is a work of art, though you may be wasting your time, you will\nnot be making yourself ridiculous. But when you treat a picture as a\nwork of art, you have, unconsciously perhaps, made a far more important\nmoral judgment. You have assigned it to a class of objects so powerful\nand direct as means to spiritual exaltation that all minor merits are\ninconsiderable. Paradoxical as it may seem, the only relevant qualities\nin a work of art, judged as art, are artistic qualities: judged as a\nmeans to good, no other qualities are worth considering; for there are\nno qualities of greater moral value than artistic qualities, since there\nis no greater means to good than art.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 5: \"An Essay in Aesthetics,\" by Roger Fry: _The New\nQuarterly_, No. 6, vol. ii.]\n\n[Footnote 6: McTaggart: _Some Dogmas of Religion_.]\n\n[Footnote 7: I am aware that there are men of science who preserve an\nopen mind as to the reality of the physical universe, and recognise that\nwhat is known as \"the scientific hypothesis\" leaves out of account just\nthose things that seem to us most real. Doubtless these are the true men\nof science; they are not the common ones.]\n\n[Footnote 8: I should not have expected the wars of so-called religion\nor the Puritan revolution to have awakened in men a sense of the\nemotional significance of the universe, and I should be a good deal\nsurprised if Sir Edward Carson's agitation were to produce in the\nNorth-East of Ireland a crop of first-rate formal expression.]\n\n[Footnote 9: Formerly he held that inanimate beauty also was good in\nitself. But this tenet, I am glad to learn, he has discarded.]\n\n\n\n\n                III\n\n         THE CHRISTIAN SLOPE\n\n\n    I. THE RISE OF CHRISTIAN ART\n\n   II. GREATNESS AND DECLINE\n\n  III. THE CLASSICAL RENAISSANCE AND ITS DISEASES\n\n   IV. ALID EX ALIO\n\n\n  [Illustration: _Photo, Alinari_\n  BYZANTINE MOSAIC, SIXTH CENTURY\n  _S. Vitale, Ravenna_]\n\n\n\n\nI\n\nTHE RISE OF CHRISTIAN ART\n\n\nWhat do I mean by a slope? That I hope to make clear in the course of\nthis chapter and the next. But, as readers may expect something to go on\nwith, I will explain immediately that, though I recognise the continuity\nof the stream of art, I believe that it is possible and proper to divide\nthat stream into slopes and movements. About the exact line of division\nthere can be no certainty. It is easy to say that in the passage of a\ngreat river from the hills to the sea, the depth, the width, the colour,\nthe temperature, and the velocity of the waters are bound to change; to\nfix precisely the point of change is another matter. If I try to picture\nfor myself the whole history of art from earliest times in all parts of\nthe world I am unable, of course, to see it as a single thread. The\nstuff of which it is made is unchangeable, it is always water that flows\ndown the river, but there is more than one channel: for instance, there\nis European art and Oriental. To me the universal history of art has the\nlook of a map in which several streams descend from the same range of\nmountains to the same sea. They start from different altitudes but all\ndescend at last to one level. Thus, I should say that the slope at the\nhead of which stand the Buddhist masterpieces of the Wei, Liang, and\nT'ang dynasties begins a great deal higher than the slope at the head of\nwhich are the Greek primitives of the seventh century, and higher than\nthat of which early Sumerian sculpture is the head; but when we have to\nconsider contemporary Japanese art, Graeco-Roman and Roman sculpture,\nand late Assyrian, we see that all have found the same sea-level of\nnasty naturalism.\n\nBy a slope, then, I mean that which lies between a great primitive\nmorning, when men create art because they must, and that darkest hour\nwhen men confound imitation with art. These slopes can be subdivided\ninto movements. The downward course of a slope is not smooth and even,\nbut broken and full of accidents. Indeed the procession of art does not\nso much resemble a river as a road from the mountains to the plain. That\nroad is a sequence of ups and downs. An up and a down together form a\nmovement. Sometimes the apex of one movement seems to reach as high as\nthe apex of the movement that preceded it, but always its base carries\nus farther down the slope. Also, in the history of art the summit of one\nmovement seems always to spring erect from the trough of its\npredecessor. The upward stroke is vertical, the downward an inclined\nplane. For instance, from Duccio to Giotto is a step up, sharp and\nshallow. From Giotto to Lionardo is a long and, at times, almost\nimperceptible fall. Duccio is a fine decadent of that Basilian movement\nwhich half survived the Latin conquest and came to an exquisite end\nunder the earlier Palaeologi. The peak of that movement rises high above\nGiotto, though Duccio near its base is below him. Giotto's art is\ndefinitely inferior to the very finest Byzantine of the eleventh and\ntwelfth centuries, and Giotto is the crest of a new movement destined\nand doomed inevitably to sink to depths undreamed of by Duccio.\n\nAll that was spiritual in Greek civilisation was sick before the sack of\nCorinth, and all that was alive in Greek art had died many years\nearlier. That it had died before the death of Alexander let his tomb at\nConstantinople be my witness. Before they set the last stone of the\nParthenon it was ailing: the big marbles in the British Museum are the\nlast significant examples of Greek art; the frieze, of course, proves\nnothing, being mere artisan work. But the man who made what one may as\nwell call \"The Theseus\" and \"The Ilissus,\" the man whom one may as well\ncall Phidias, crowns the last vital movement in the Hellenic slope. He\nis a genius, but he is no oddity: he falls quite naturally into his\nplace as the master of the early decadence; he is the man in whom runs\nrich and fast but a little coarsened the stream of inspiration that gave\nlife to archaic Greek sculpture. He is the Giotto--but an inferior\nGiotto--of the slope that starts from the eighth century B.C.--so\ninferior to the sixth century A.D.--to peter out in the bogs of\nHellenistic and Roman rubbish. Whence sprang that Hellenic impulse? As\nyet we cannot tell. Probably, from the ruins of some venerable\nMediterranean civility, against the complex materialism of which it was,\nin its beginnings, I dare say, a reaction. The story of its prime can be\nread in fragments of archaic sculpture scattered throughout Europe, and\nstudied in the National Museum at Athens, where certain statues of\nathletes, dating from about 600, reveal the excellences and defects of\nGreek art at its best. Of its early decline in the fifth century Phidias\nis the second-rate Giotto; the copies of his famous contemporaries and\nimmediate predecessors are too loathsome to be at all just; Praxiteles,\nin the fourth century, the age of accomplished prettiness, is the\nCorreggio, or whatever delightful trifler your feeling for art and\nchronology may suggest. Fifth and fourth century architecture forbid us\nto forget the greatness of the Greeks in the golden age of their\nintellectual and political history. The descent from sensitive, though\nalways rather finikin, drawing through the tasteful and accomplished to\nthe feebly forcible may be followed in the pots and vases of the sixth,\nfifth, fourth, and third centuries. In the long sands and flats of Roman\nrealism the stream of Greek inspiration is lost for ever.\n\nBefore the death of Marcus Aurelius, Europe was as weary of materialism\nas England before the death of Victoria. But what power was to destroy a\nmachine that had enslaved men so completely that they dared not conceive\nan alternative? The machine was grown so huge that man could no longer\npeer over its side; man could see nothing but its cranks and levers,\ncould hear nothing but its humming, could mark the spinning fly-wheel\nand fancy himself in contemplation of the revolving spheres.\nAnnihilation was the only escape for the Roman citizen from the Roman\nEmpire. Yet, while in the West Hadrian was raising the Imperial talent\nfor brutalisation to a system and a science, somewhere in the East, in\nEgypt, or in Asia Minor, or, more probably in Syria, in Mesopotamia, or\neven Persia, the new leaven was at work. That power which was to free\nthe world was in ferment. The religious spirit was again coming to\nbirth. Here and there, in face of the flat contradiction of\ncircumstances, one would arise and assert that man does not live by\nbread alone. Orphism, Mythraism, Christianity, many forms of one spirit,\nwere beginning to mean something more than curious ritual and discreet\ndebauch. Very slowly a change was coming over the face of Europe.\n\nThere was change before the signs of it became apparent. The earliest\nChristian paintings in the catacombs are purely classical. If the early\nChristians felt anything new they could not express it. But before the\nsecond century was out Coptic craftsmen had begun to weave into dead\nRoman designs something vital. The academic patterns are queerly\ndistorted and flattened out into forms of a certain significance, as we\ncan feel for ourselves if we go to the textile room at South Kensington.\nCertainly, these second century Coptic textiles are more like works of\nart than anything that had been produced in the Roman Empire for more\nthan four hundred years. Egyptian paintings of the third century bear\nless positive witness to the fumblings of a new spirit. But at the\nbeginning of the fourth century Diocletian built his palace at Spalato,\nwhere we have all learned to see classicism and the new spirit from the\nEast fighting it out side by side; and, if we may trust Strzygowski,\nfrom the end of that century dates the beautiful church of Kodja-Kalessi\nin Isauria. The century in which the East finally dominated the West\n(350-450) is a period of incubation. It is a time of disconcerting\nactivity that precedes the unmistakable launch of art upon the Christian\nslope. I would confidently assert that every artistic birth is preceded\nby a period of uneasy gestation in which the unborn child acquires the\norgans and energy that are to carry it forward on its long journey, if\nonly I possessed the data that would give a tottering support to so\ncomforting a generalisation. Alas! the births of the great slopes of\nantiquity are shrouded in a night scarcely ruffled by the minute\nresearches of patient archaeologists and impervious to the startling\ndiscoveries by experts of more or less palpable forgeries. Of these\ncritical periods we dare not speak confidently; nevertheless we can\ncompare the fifth century with the nineteenth and draw our own\nconclusions.\n\nIn 450 they built the lovely Galla Placidia at Ravenna. It is a building\nessentially un-Roman; that is to say, the Romanism that clings to it is\naccidental and adds nothing to its significance. The mosaics within,\nhowever, are still coarsely classical. There is a nasty, woolly realism\nabout the sheep, and about the good shepherd more than a suspicion of\nthe stodgy, Graeco-Roman, Apollo. Imitation still fights, though it\nfights a losing battle, with significant form. When S. Vitale was begun\nin 526 the battle was won. Sta. Sophia at Constantinople was building\nbetween 532 and 537; the finest mosaics in S. Vitale, S.\nApollinare-Nuovo and S. Apollinare-in-Classe belong to the sixth\ncentury; so do SS. Sergius and Bacchus at Constantinople and the Duomo\nat Parenzo. In fact, to the sixth century belong the most majestic\nmonuments of Byzantine art. It is the primitive and supreme summit of\nthe Christian slope. The upward spring from the levels of\nGraeco-Romanism is immeasurable. The terms in which it could be stated\nhave yet to be discovered. It is the whole length of the slope from Sta.\nSophia to the Victoria Memorial pushed upright to stand on a base of a\nhundred years. We are on heights from which the mud-flats are invisible;\nresting here, one can hardly believe that the flats ever were, or, at\nany rate, that they will ever be again. Go to Ravenna, and you will see\nthe masterpieces of Christian art, the primitives of the slope: go to\nthe Tate Gallery or the Luxembourg, and you will see the end of that\nslope--Christian art at its last gasp. These _memento mori_ are salutary\nin an age of assurance when, looking at the pictures of Cezanne, we\nfeel, not inexcusably, that we are high above the mud and malaria.\nBetween Cezanne and another Tate Gallery, what lies in store for the\nhuman spirit? Are we in the period of a new incubation? Or is the new\nage born? Is it a new slope that we are on, or are we merely part of a\nsurprisingly vigorous premonitory flutter? These are queries to ponder.\nIs Cezanne the beginning of a slope, a portent, or merely the crest of a\nmovement? The oracles are dumb. This alone seems to me sure: since the\nByzantine primitives set their mosaics at Ravenna no artist in Europe\nhas created forms of greater significance unless it be Cezanne.\n\nWith Sta. Sophia at Constantinople, and the sixth century churches and\nmosaics at Ravenna, the Christian slope establishes itself in\nEurope.[10] In the same century it took a downward twist at\nConstantinople; but in one part of Europe or another the new inspiration\ncontinued to manifest itself supremely for more than six hundred years.\nThere were ups and downs, of course, movements and reactions; in some\nplaces art was almost always good, in others it was never first-rate;\nbut there was no universal, irreparable depreciation till Norman and\nRomanesque architecture gave way to Gothic, till twelfth-century\nsculpture became thirteenth-century figuration.\n\nChristian art preserved its primitive significance for more than half a\nmillennium. Therein I see no marvel. Even ideas and emotions travelled\nslowly in those days. In one respect, at any rate, trains and\nsteam-boats have fulfilled the predictions of their exploiters--they\nhave made everything move faster: the mistake lies in being quite so\npositive that this is a blessing. In those dark ages things moved\nslowly; that is one reason why the new force had not spent itself in six\nhundred years. Another is that the revelation came to an age that was\nconstantly breaking fresh ground. Always there was a virgin tract at\nhand to take the seed and raise a lusty crop. Between 500 and 1000\nA.D. the population of Europe was fluid. Some new race was\nalways catching the inspiration and feeling and expressing it with\nprimitive sensibility and passion. The last to be infected was one of\nthe finest; and in the eleventh century Norman power and French\nintelligence produced in the west of Europe a manifestation of the\nChristian ferment only a little inferior to that which five hundred\nyears earlier had made glorious the East.\n\nLet me insist once again that, when I speak of the Christian ferment or\nthe Christian slope, I am not thinking of dogmatic religion. I am\nthinking of that religious spirit of which Christianity, with its dogmas\nand rituals, is one manifestation, Buddhism another. And when I speak of\nart as a manifestation of the religious spirit I do not mean that art\nexpresses particular religious emotions, much less that it expresses\nanything theological. I have said that if art expresses anything, it\nexpresses an emotion felt for pure form and that which gives pure form\nits extraordinary significance. So, when I speak of Christian art, I\nmean that this art was one product of that state of enthusiasm of which\nthe Christian Church is another. So far was the new spirit from being a\nmere ebullition of Christian faith that we find manifestations of it in\nMohammedan art; everyone who has seen a photograph of the Mosque of Omar\nat Jerusalem knows that. The emotional renaissance in Europe was not the\nwide-spreading of Christian doctrines, but it was through Christian\ndoctrine that Europe came to know of the rediscovery of the emotional\nsignificance of the Universe. Christian art is not an expression of\nspecific Christian emotions; but it was only when men had been roused by\nChristianity that they began to feel the emotions that express\nthemselves in form. It was Christianity that put Europe into that state\nof emotional turmoil from which sprang Christian art.\n\nFor a moment, in the sixth century, the flood of enthusiasm seems to\nhave carried the Eastern world, even the official world, off its feet.\nBut Byzantine officials were no fonder of swimming than others. The men\nwho worked the imperial machine, studied the Alexandrine poets, and\ndabbled in classical archaeology were not the men to look forward. Only\nthe people, led by the monks, were vaguely, and doubtless stupidly, on\nthe side of emotion and the future. Soon after Justinian's death the\nEmpire began to divide itself into two camps. Appropriately, religious\nart was the standard of the popular party, and around that standard the\nbattle raged. \"No man,\" said Lord Melbourne, \"has more respect for the\nChristian religion than I; but when it comes to dragging it into private\nlife....\" At Constantinople they began dragging religion, and art too,\ninto the sanctity of private capital. Now, no official worth his salt\ncan watch the shadow being recklessly sacrificed to the substance\nwithout itching to set the police on somebody; and the vigilance and\nsagacity of Byzantine civilians has become proverbial. We learn from a\nletter written by Pope Gregory II to the Emperor Leo, the iconoclast,\nthat men were willing to give their estates for a picture. This, to\nPope, Emperor, and Mr. Finlay the historian, was proof enough of\nappalling demoralisation. For a parallel, I suppose, they recalled the\nshameful imprudence of the Magdalene. There were people at\nConstantinople who took art seriously, though in a rather too literary\nspirit--\"dicunt enim artem pictoriam piam esse.\" This sort of thing had\nto be stopped. Early in the eighth century began the iconoclast\nonslaught. The history of that hundred years' war, in which the popular\nparty carried on a spirited and finally successful resistance, does not\nconcern us. One detail, however, is worth noticing. During the\niconoclast persecution a new popular art makes its appearance in and\nabout those remote monasteries that were the strongholds of the mystics.\nOf this art the Chloudof Psalter is the most famous example. Certainly\nthe art of the Chloudof Psalter is not great. A desire to be\nillustrative generally mars both the drawing and the design. It mars,\nbut does not utterly ruin; in many of the drawings something significant\npersists. There is, however, always too much realism and too much\nliterature. But neither the realism nor the literature is derived from\nclassical models. The work is essentially original. It is also\nessentially popular. Indeed, it is something of a party pamphlet; and in\none place we see the Emperor and his cabinet doing duty as a conclave of\nthe damned. It would be easy to overrate the artistic value of the\nChloudof Psalter, but as a document it is of the highest importance,\nbecause it brings out clearly the opposition between the official art of\nthe iconoclasts that leaned on the Hellenistic tradition and borrowed\nbluntly from Bagdad, and the vital art that drew its inspiration from\nthe Christian movement and transmuted all its borrowing into something\nnew. Side by side with this live art of the Christian movement we shall\nsee a continuous output of work based on the imitation of classical\nmodels. Those coarse and dreary objects that crop up more or less\nfrequently in early Byzantine, Merovingian, Carolingian, Ottonian,\nRomanesque, and early Italian art, are not, however, an inheritance from\nthe iconoclastic period; they are the long shadow thrown across history\nby the gigantic finger of imperial Rome. The mischief done by the\niconoclasts was not irreparable, but it was grave. True to their class,\nByzantine officials indulged a taste for furniture, giving thereby an\nunintentional sting to their attack. Like the grandees of the Classical\nRenaissance, they degraded art, which is a religion, to upholstery, a\nmenial trade. They patronised craftsmen who looked not into their\nhearts, but into the past--who from the court of the Kalif brought\npretty patterns, and from classical antiquity elegant illusions, to do\nduty for significant design. They looked to Greece and Rome as did the\nmen of the Renaissance, and, like them, lost in the science of\nrepresentation the art of creation. In the age of the iconoclasts,\nmodelling--the coarse Roman modelling--begins to bulge and curl\nluxuriously at Constantinople. The eighth century in the East is a\nportent of the sixteenth in the West. It is the restoration of\nmaterialism with its paramour, obsequious art. The art of the\niconoclasts tells us the story of their days; it is descriptive,\nofficial, eclectic, historical, plutocratic, palatial, and vulgar.\nFortunately, its triumph was partial and ephemeral.\n\nFor art was still too vigorous to be strangled by a pack of cultivated\nmandarins. In the end the mystics triumphed. Under the Regent Theodora\n(842) the images were finally restored; under the Basilian dynasty\n(867-1057) and under the Comneni Byzantine art enjoyed a second golden\nage. And though I cannot rate the best Byzantine art of the ninth,\ntenth, eleventh, and twelfth centuries quite so high as I rate that of\nthe sixth, I am inclined to hold it superior, not only to anything that\nwas to come, but also to the very finest achievement of the greatest\nages of Egypt, Crete, and Greece.\n\n\n\n\nII\n\nGREATNESS AND DECLINE\n\n\nHaving glanced at the beginnings of Christian art, we must not linger\nover the history of Byzantine. Eastern traders and artisans, pushing\ninto Western Europe from the Adriatic and along the valley of the Rhone,\ncarried with them the ferment. Monks driven out of the East by the\niconoclast persecutions found Western Europe Christian and left it\nreligious. The strength of the movement in Europe between 500 and 900 is\ncommonly under-rated. That is partly because its extant monuments are\nnot obvious. Buildings are the things to catch the eye, and, outside\nRavenna, there is comparatively little Christian architecture of this\nperiod. Also the cultivated, spoon-fed art of the renaissance court of\nCharlemagne is too often allowed to misrepresent one age and disgust\nanother. Of course the bulk of those opulent knick-knacks manufactured\nfor the Carolingian and Ottonian Emperors, and now to be seen at Aachen,\nare as beastly as anything else that is made simply to be precious. They\nreflect German taste at its worst; and, in tracing the line, or\nestimating the value, of the Christian slope it is prudent to overlook\neven the best of Teutonic effort.[11] For the bulk of it is not\nprimitive or mediaeval or renaissance art, but German art. At any rate\nit is a manifestation of national character rather than of aesthetic\ninspiration. Most aesthetic creation bears the mark of nationality; very\nfew manifestations of German nationality bear a trace of aesthetic\ncreation. The differences between the treasures of Aachen, early German\narchitecture, fifteenth-century German sculpture, and the work produced\nto-day at Munich are superficial. Almost all is profoundly German, and\nnothing else. That is to say, it is conscientious, rightly intentioned,\nexcessively able, and lacking in just that which distinguishes a work of\nart from everything else in the world. The inspiration and sensibility\nof the dark ages can be felt most surely and most easily in the works of\nminor art produced in France and Italy.[12] In Italy, however, there is\nenough architecture to prove up to the hilt, were further proof\nrequired, that the spirit was vigorous. It is the age of what Sig.\nRivoira calls Pre-Lombardic Architecture--Italian Byzantine: it is the\nage of the Byzantine school of painting at Rome.[13]\n\nWhat the \"Barbarians\" did, indirectly, for art cannot be over-estimated.\nThey almost extinguished the tradition of culture, they began to destroy\nthe bogey of imperialism, they cleaned the slate. They were able to\nprovide new bottles for the new wine. Artists can scarcely repress their\nenvy when they hear that academic painters and masters were sold into\nslavery by the score. The Barbarians handed on the torch and wrought\nmarvels in its light. But in those days men were too busy fighting and\nploughing and praying to have much time for anything else. Material\nneeds absorbed their energies without fattening them; their spiritual\nappetite was ferocious, but they had a live religion as well as a live\nart to satisfy it. It is supposed that in the dark ages insecurity and\nwant reduced humanity to something little better than bestiality. To\nthis their art alone gives the lie, and there is other evidence. If\nturbulence and insecurity could reduce people to bestiality, surely the\nItalians of the ninth century were the men to roar and bleat. Constantly\nharassed by Saracens, Hungarians, Greeks, French, and every sort of\nGerman, they had none of those encouragements to labour and create which\nin the vast security of the _pax Romana_ and the _pax Britannica_ have\nborne such glorious fruits of private virtue and public magnificence.\nYet in 898 Hungarian scouts report that northern Italy is thickly\npopulated and full of fortified towns.[14] At the sack of Parma (924)\nforty-four churches were burnt, and these churches were certainly more\nlike Santa Maria di Pomposa or San Pietro at Toscanella than the\nColosseum or the Royal Courts of Justice. That the artistic output of\nthe dark ages was to some extent limited by its poverty is not to be\ndoubted; nevertheless, more first-rate art was produced in Europe\nbetween the years 500 and 900 than was produced in the same countries\nbetween 1450 and 1850.\n\nFor in estimating the artistic value of a period one tends first to\nconsider the splendour of its capital achievements. After that one\nreckons the quantity of first-rate work produced. Lastly, one computes\nthe proportion of undeniable works of art to the total output. In the\ndark ages the proportion seems to have been high. This is a\ncharacteristic of primitive periods. The market is too small to tempt a\ncrowd of capable manufacturers, and the conditions of life are too\nsevere to support the ordinary academy or salon exhibitor who lives on\nhis private means and takes to art because he is unfit for anything\nelse. This sort of producer, whose existence tells us less about the\nstate of art than about the state of society, who would be the worst\nnavvy in his gang or the worst trooper in his squadron, and is the\nstaple product of official art schools, is unheard of in primitive ages.\nIn drawing inferences, therefore, we must not overlook the advantage\nenjoyed by barbarous periods in the fact that of those who come forward\nas artists the vast majority have some real gift. I would hazard a guess\nthat of the works that survive from the dark age as high a proportion as\none in twelve has real artistic value. Were a proportion of the work\nproduced between 1450 and 1850 identical with that of the work produced\nbetween 500 and 900 to survive, it might very well happen that it would\nnot contain a single work of art. In fact, we tend to see only the more\nimportant things of this period and to leave unvisited the notorious\ntrash. Yet judging from the picked works brought to our notice in\ngalleries, exhibitions, and private collections, I cannot believe that\nmore than one in a hundred of the works produced between 1450 and 1850\ncan be properly described as a work of art.\n\nBetween 900 and 1200 the capital achievements of Christian art are not\nsuperior in quality to those of the preceding age--indeed, they fall\nshort of the Byzantine masterpieces of the sixth century; but the\nfirst-rate art of this second period was more abundant, or, at any rate,\nhas survived more successfully, than that of the first. The age that\nhas bequeathed us Romanesque, Lombardic, and Norman architecture gives\nno sign of dissolution. We are still on the level heights of the\nChristian Renaissance. Artists are still primitive. Men still feel the\nsignificance of form sufficiently to create it copiously. Increased\nwealth purchases increased leisure, and some of that leisure is devoted\nto the creation of art. I do not marvel, therefore, at the common,\nthough I think inexact, opinion that this was the period in which\nChristian Europe touched the summit of its spiritual history: its\nmonuments are everywhere majestic before our eyes. Not only in France,\nItaly, and Spain, but in England, and as far afield as Denmark, Norway,\nand Sweden, we can see the triumphs of Romanesque art. This was the last\nlevel stage on the long journey from Santa Sophia to St. John's Wood.\n\nWith Gothic architecture the descent began. Gothic architecture is\njuggling in stone and glass. It is the convoluted road that ends in a\nbridecake or a cucumber frame. A Gothic cathedral is a _tour de force_;\nit is also a melodrama. Enter, and you will be impressed by the\nincredible skill of the constructor; perhaps you will be impressed by a\nsense of dim mystery and might; you will not be moved by pure form. You\nmay groan \"A-a-h\" and collapse: you will not be strung to austere\necstasy. Walk round it, and take your pleasure in subtleties of the\nbuilder's craft, quaint corners, gargoyles, and flying buttresses, but\ndo not expect the thrill that answers the perception of sheer rightness\nof form. In architecture the new spirit first came to birth; in\narchitecture first it dies.\n\nWe find the spirit alive at the very end of the twelfth century in\nRomanesque sculpture and in stained glass: we can see it at Chartres and\nat Bourges. At Bourges there is an indication of the way things are\ngoing in the fact that in an unworthy building we find glass and some\nfragments of sculpture worthy of Chartres, and not unworthy of any age\nor place. Cimabue and Duccio are the last great exponents in the West of\nthe greater tradition--the tradition that held the essential everything\nand the accidental nothing. For with Duccio, at any rate, the sense of\nform was as much traditional as vital: and the great Cimabue is _fin de\nsiecle_. They say that Cimabue died in 1302; Duccio about fifteen years\nlater. With Giotto (born 1276), a greater artist than either, we turn a\ncorner as sharp as that which had been turned a hundred years earlier\nwith the invention of Gothic architecture in France. For Giotto could be\nintentionally second-rate. He was capable of sacrificing form to drama\nand anecdote. He never left the essential out, but he sometimes knocked\nits corners off. He was always more interested in art than in St.\nFrancis, but he did not always remember that St. Francis has nothing\nwhatever to do with art. In theory that is right enough; the Byzantines\nhad believed that they were more interested in dogmatic theology than in\nform, and almost every great artist has had some notion of the sort.\nIndeed, it seems that there is nothing so dangerous for an artist as\nconsciously to care about nothing but art. For an artist to believe that\nhis art is concerned with religion or politics or morals or psychology\nor scientific truth is well; it keeps him alive and passionate and\nvigorous: it keeps him up out of sentimental aestheticism: it keeps to\nhand a suitable artistic problem. But for an artist not to be able to\nforget all about these things as easily as a man who is playing a salmon\nforgets his lunch is the devil. Giotto lacked facility in forgetting.\nThere are frescoes in which, failing to grasp the significance of a\nform, he allows it to state a fact or suggest a situation. Giotto went\nhigher than Cimabue but he often aimed lower. Compare his \"Virgin and\nChild\" in the Accademia with that of Cimabue in the same gallery, and\nyou will see how low his humanism could bring him. The coarse heaviness\nof the forms of that woman and her baby is unthinkable in Cimabue; for\nCimabue had learnt from the Byzantines that forms should be significant\nand not lifelike. Doubtless in the minds of both there was something\nbesides a preoccupation with formal combinations; but Giotto has allowed\nthat \"something\" to dominate his design, Cimabue has forced his design\nto dominate it. There is something protestant about Giotto's picture. He\nis so dreadfully obsessed by the idea that the humanity of the mother\nand child is the important thing about them that he has insisted on it\nto the detriment of his art. Cimabue was incapable of such commonness.\nTherefore make the comparison--it is salutary and instructive; and then\ngo to Santa Croce or the Arena Chapel and admit that if the greatest\nname in European painting is not Cezanne it is Giotto.\n\nFrom the peak that is Giotto the road falls slowly but steadily. Giotto\nheads a movement towards imitation and scientific picture-making. A\ngenius such as his was bound to be the cause of a movement; it need not\nhave been the cause of such a movement. But the spirit of an age is\nstronger than the echoes of tradition, sound they never so sweetly. And\nthe spirit of that age, as every extension lecturer knows, moved towards\nTruth and Nature, away from supernatural ecstasies. There is a moment at\nwhich the spirit begins to crave for Truth and Nature, for naturalism\nand verisimilitude; in the history of art it is known as the early\ndecadence. Nevertheless, on naturalism and materialism a constant war is\nwaged by one or two great souls athirst for pure aesthetic rapture; and\nthis war, strangely enough, is invariably described by the extension\nlecturer as a fight for Truth and Nature. Never doubt it, in a hundred\nyears or less they will be telling their pupils that in an age of\nextreme artificiality arose two men, Cezanne and Gaugin, who, by\nsimplicity and sincerity, led back the world to the haunts of Truth and\nNature. Strangest of all, some part of what they say will be right.\n\nThe new movement broke up the great Byzantine tradition,[15] and left\nthe body of art a victim to the onslaught of that strange, new disease,\nthe Classical Renaissance. The tract that lies between Giotto and\nLionardo is the beginning of the end; but it is not the end. Painting\ncame to maturity late, and died hard; and the art of the fourteenth and\nfifteenth centuries--especially the Tuscan schools--is not a mere\nhistorical link: it is an important movement, or rather two. The great\nSienese names, Ugolino, Ambrogio Lorenzetti,[16] and Simone Martini,\nbelong to the old world as much as to the new; but the movement that\nproduced Masaccio, Masolino, Castagno, Donatello, Piero della Francesca,\nand Fra Angelico is a reaction from the Giottesque tradition of the\nfourteenth century, and an extremely vital movement. Often, it seems,\nthe stir and excitement provoked by the ultimately disastrous scientific\ndiscoveries were a cause of good art. It was the disinterested\nadoration of perspective, I believe, that enabled Uccello and the Paduan\nMantegna to apprehend form passionately. The artist must have something\nto get into a passion about.\n\nOutside Italy, at the beginning of the thirteenth century, the\napproaches of spiritual bankruptcy are more obvious, though here, too,\npainting makes a better fight than architecture. Seven hundred years of\nglorious and incessant creation seem to have exhausted the constructive\ngenius of Europe. Gothic architecture becomes something so nauseous[17]\nthat one can only rejoice when, in the sixteenth century, the sponge is\nthrown up for good, and, abandoning all attempt to create, Europe\nsettles down quietly to imitate classical models. All true creation was\ndead long before that; its epitaph had been composed by the master of\nthe \"Haute Oeuvre\" at Beauvais. Only intellectual invention dragged on\na sterile and unlucky existence. A Gothic church of the late Middle Ages\nis a thing made to order. A building formula has been devised within\nwhich the artificer, who has ousted the artist, finds endless\nopportunity for displaying his address. The skill of the juggler and the\ntaste of the pastrycook are in great demand now that the power to feel\nand the genius to create have been lost. There is brisk trade in pretty\nthings; buildings are stuck all over with them. Go and peer at each one\nseparately if you have a tooth for cheap sweet-meats.\n\nPainting, outside Italy, was following more deliberately the road\nindicated by architecture. In illuminated manuscripts it is easy to\nwatch the steady coarsening of line and colour. By the beginning of the\nfourteenth century, Limoges enamels have fallen into that state of\ndamnation from which they have never attempted to rise. Of trans-Alpine\nfiguration after 1250 the less said the better. If in Italian painting\nthe slope is more gentle, that is partly because the spirit of the\nByzantine renaissance died harder there, partly because the descent was\nbroken by individual artists who rose superior to their circumstances.\nBut here, too, intellect is filling the void left by emotion; science\nand culture are doing their work. By the year 1500 the stream of\ninspiration had grown so alarmingly thin that there was only just\nenough to turn the wheels of the men of genius. The minor artists seem\nalready prepared to resign themselves to the inevitable. Since we are no\nlonger artists who move, let us be craftsmen who astonish. 'Tis a fine\nthing to tempt urchins with painted apples: that makes the people stare.\nTo be sure, such feats are rather beneath the descendants of Giotto; we\nleave them to the Dutchmen, whom we envy a little all the same. We have\nlost art; let us study the science of imitation. Here is a field for\nlearning and dexterity. And, as our patrons who have lost their\naesthetic perceptions have not lost all their senses, let us flatter\nthem with grateful objects: let our grapes and girls be as luscious as\nlifelike. But the patrons are not all sensualists; some of them are\nscholars. The trade in imitations of the antique is almost as good as\nthe trade in imitations of nature. Archaeology and connoisseurship,\nthose twin ticks on palsied art, are upon us. To react to form a man\nneeds sensibility; to know whether rules have been respected knowledge\nof these rules alone is necessary. By the end of the fifteenth century\nart is becoming a question of rules; appreciation a matter of\nconnoisseurship.\n\nLiterature is never pure art. Very little literature is a pure\nexpression of emotion; none, I think is an expression of pure inhuman\nemotion. Most of it is concerned, to some extent, with facts and ideas:\nit is intellectual. Therefore literature is a misleading guide to the\nhistory of art. Its history is the history of literature; and it is a\ngood guide to the history of thought. Yet sometimes literature will\nprovide the historian of art with a pretty piece of collateral evidence.\nFor instance, the fact that Charles the Great ordained that the Frankish\nsongs should be collected and written down makes a neat pendant to the\nrenaissance art of Aachen. People who begin to collect have lost the\nfirst fury of creation. The change that came over plastic art in France\ntowards the end of the twelfth century is reflected in the accomplished\ntriviality of Chretien de Troyes. The eleventh century had produced the\n_Chanson de Roland_, a poem as grand and simple as a Romanesque church.\nChretien de Troyes melted down the massive conceptions of his betters\nand twisted them into fine-spun conceits. He produced a poem as\npinnacled, deft, and insignificant as Rouen Cathedral. In literature, as\nin the visual arts, Italy held out longest, and, when she fell, fell\nlike Lucifer, never to rise again. In Italy there was no literary\nrenaissance; there was just a stirring of the rubbish heap. If ever man\nwas a full-stop, that man was Boccaccio. Dante died at Ravenna in 1321.\nHis death is a landmark in the spiritual history of Europe. Behind him\nlies that which, taken with the _Divina Commedia_, has won for Italy an\nexaggerated literary reputation. In the thirteenth century there was\nplenty of poetry hardly inferior to the _Lamento_ of Rinaldo; in the\nfourteenth comes Petrarch with the curse of mellifluous phrase-making.\n\nMay God forget me if I forget the great Italian art of the fifteenth\ncentury. But, a host of individual geniuses and a cloud of admirable\npainters notwithstanding, the art of the fifteenth century was further\nfrom grace than that of the Giottesque painters of the fourteenth. And\nthe whole output of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries is\nimmeasurably inferior to the great Byzantine and Romanesque production\nof the eleventh and twelfth. Indeed, it is inferior in quality, if not\nin quantity, to the decadent Byzantine and Italian Byzantine of the\nthirteenth. Therefore I will say that, already at the end of the\nfourteenth century, though Castagno and Masolino and Gentile da\nFabriano and Fra Angelico were alive, and Masaccio and Piero and Bellini\nhad yet to be born, it looked as if the road that started from\nConstantinople in the sixth century were about to end in a glissade.\nFrom Buda-Pest to Sligo, \"late Gothic\" stands for something as foul\nalmost as \"revival.\" Having come through the high passes, Europe, it\nseemed, was going to end her journey by plunging down a precipice.\nPerhaps it would have been as well; but it was not to be. The headlong\nrush was to be checked. The descent was to be eased by a strange detour,\nby a fantastic adventure, a revival that was no re-birth, a Medea's\ncauldron rather, an extravagant disease full of lust and laughter; the\nlife of the old world was to be prolonged by four hundred years or so,\nby the galvanising power of the Classical Renaissance.\n\n\n\n\nIII\n\nTHE CLASSICAL RENAISSANCE AND ITS DISEASES\n\n\nThe Classical Renaissance is nothing more than a big kink in the long\nslope; but it is a very big one. It is an intellectual event.\nEmotionally the consumption that was wasting Europe continued to run its\ncourse; the Renaissance was a mere fever-flash. To literature, however,\nits importance is immense: for literature can make itself independent of\nspiritual health, and is as much concerned with ideas as with emotions.\nLiterature can subsist in dignity on ideas. Finlay's history of the\nByzantine Empire provokes no emotion worth talking about, yet I would\ngive Mr. Finlay a place amongst men of letters, and I would do as much\nfor Hobbes, Mommsen, Sainte-Beuve, Samuel Johnson, and Aristotle. Great\nthinking without great feeling will make great literature. It is not for\ntheir emotional qualities that we value many of our most valued books.\nAnd when it is for an emotional quality, to what extent is that emotion\naesthetic? I know how little the intellectual and factual content of\ngreat poetry has to do with its significance. The actual meaning of the\nwords in Shakespeare's songs, the purest poetry in English, is generally\neither trivial or trite. They are nursery-rhymes or drawing-room\nditties;--\n\n  \"Come away, come away, death,\n    And in sad cypress let me be laid;\n  Fly away, fly away, breath;\n    I am slain by a fair cruel maid.\"\n\nCould anything be more commonplace?\n\n        \"Hark, hark!\n          Bow, wow,\n        The watch-dogs bark;\n          Bow, wow,\n        Hark, hark! I hear\n  The strain of strutting chanticleer\n      Cry, Cock-a-diddle-dow!\"\n\nWhat could be more nonsensical? In the verse of our second poet,\nMilton--so great that before his name the word \"second\" rings false as\nthe giggle of fatuity--the ideas are frequently shallow and the facts\ngenerally false. In Dante, if the ideas are sometimes profound and the\nemotions awful, they are also, as a rule, repugnant to our better\nfeelings: the facts are the hoardings of a parish scold. In great poetry\nit is the formal music that makes the miracle. The poet expresses in\nverbal form an emotion but distantly related to the words set down. But\nit is related; it is not a purely artistic emotion. In poetry form and\nits significance are not everything; the form and the content are not\none. Though some of Shakespeare's songs approach purity, there is, in\nfact, an alloy. The form is burdened with an intellectual content, and\nthat content is a mood that mingles with and reposes on the emotions of\nlife. That is why poetry, though it has its raptures, does not transport\nus to that remote aesthetic beatitude in which, freed from humanity, we\nare up-stayed by musical and pure visual form.\n\nThe Classical Renaissance was a new reading of human life, and what it\nadded to the emotional capital of Europe was a new sense of the\nexcitingness of human affairs. If the men and women of the Renaissance\nwere moved by Art and Nature, that was because in Art and Nature they\nsaw their own reflections. The Classical Renaissance was not a re-birth\nbut a re-discovery; and that superb mess of thought and observation,\nlust, rhetoric, and pedantry, that we call Renaissance literature, is\nits best and most characteristic monument. What it rediscovered were the\nideas from the heights of which the ancients had gained a view of life.\nThis view the Renaissance borrowed. By doing so it took the sting out of\nthe spiritual death of the late Middle Ages. It showed men that they\ncould manage very well without a soul. It made materialism tolerable by\nshowing how much can be done with matter and intellect. That was its\ngreat feat. It taught men how to make the best of a bad job; it proved\nthat by cultivating the senses and setting the intellect to brood over\nthem it is easy to whip up an emotion of sorts. When men had lost sight\nof the spirit it covered the body with a garment of glamour.\n\nThat the Classical Renaissance was essentially an intellectual movement\nis proved, I think, by the fact that it left the uneducated classes\nuntouched almost. They suffered from its consequences; it gave them\nnothing. A wave of emotion floods the back-gardens; an intellectual\nstream is kept within the irrigation channels. The Classical Renaissance\nmade absolute the divorce of the classes from the masses. The mediaeval\nlord in his castle and the mediaeval hind in his hut were spiritual\nequals who thought and felt alike, held the same hopes and fears, and\nshared, to a surprising extent, the pains and pleasures of a simple and\nrather cruel society. The Renaissance changed all that. The lord entered\nthe new world of ideas and refined sensuality; the peasant stayed where\nhe was, or, as the last vestiges of spiritual religion began to\ndisappear with the commons, sank lower. Popular art changed so gradually\nthat in the late fifteenth and in the sixteenth century we still find,\nin remote corners, things that are rude but profoundly moving. Village\nmasons could still create in stone at the time when Jacques Coeur was\nbuilding himself the first \"residence worthy of a millionaire\" that had\nbeen \"erected\" since the days of Honorius. But that popular art pursued\nthe downhill road sedately while plutocratic art went with a run is a\ncurious accident of which the traces are soon lost; the outstanding fact\nis that with the Renaissance Europe definitely turns her back on the\nspiritual view of life. With that renunciation the power of creating\nsignificant form becomes the inexplicable gift of the occasional\ngenius. Here and there an individual produces a work of art, so art\ncomes to be regarded as something essentially sporadic and peculiar. The\nartist is reckoned a freak. We are in the age of names and catalogues\nand genius-worship. Now, genius-worship is the infallible sign of an\nuncreative age. In great ages, though we may not all be geniuses, many\nof us are artists, and where there are many artists art tends to become\nanonymous.\n\nThe Classical Renaissance was something different in kind from what I\nhave called the Christian Renaissance. It must be placed somewhere\nbetween 1350 and 1600. Place it where you will. For my part I always\nthink of it as the gorgeous and well-cut garment of the years that fall\nbetween 1453 and 1594, between the capture of Constantinople and the\ndeath of Tintoretto. To me, it is the age of Lionardo, of Charles VIII\nand Francis I, of Cesare Borgia and Leo X, of Raffael, of Machiavelli,\nand of Erasmus, who carries us on to the second stage, the period of\nangry ecclesiastical politics, of Clement VII, Fontainebleau, Rabelais,\nTitian, Palladio, and Vasari. But, on any computation, in the years that\nlie between the spiritual exaltation of the early twelfth century and\nthe sturdy materialism of the late sixteenth lies the Classical\nRenaissance. Whatever happened, happened between those dates. And all\nthat did happen was nothing more than a change from late manhood to\nearly senility complicated by a house-moving, bringing with it new\nhobbies and occupations. The decline from the eleventh to the\nseventeenth century is continuous and to be foreseen; the change from\nthe world of Aurelian to the world of Gregory the Great is catastrophic.\nSince the Christian Renaissance, new ideas and knowledge\nnotwithstanding, the world has grown rotten with decency and order. It\ntakes more than the rediscovery of Greek texts and Graeco-Roman statues\nto provoke the cataclysms and earthquakes with which it grew young.\n\nThe art of the High Renaissance was conditioned by the demands of its\npatrons. There is nothing odd about that; it is a recognised stage in\nthe rake's progress. The patrons of the Renaissance wanted plenty of\nbeauty of the kind dear to the impressionable stock-jobber. Only, the\nplutocrats of the sixteenth century had a delicacy and magnificence of\ntaste which would have made the houses and manners of modern\nstock-jobbers intolerable to them. Renaissance millionaires could be\nvulgar and brutal, but they were great gentlemen. They were neither\nilliterate cads nor meddlesome puritans, nor even saviours of society.\nYet, if we are to understand the amazing popularity of Titian's and of\nVeronese's women, we must take note of their niceness to kiss and\nobvious willingness to be kissed. That beauty for which can be\nsubstituted the word \"desirableness,\" and that insignificant beauty\nwhich is the beauty of gems, were in great demand. Imitation was wanted,\ntoo; for if pictures are to please as suggestions and mementoes, the\nobjects that suggest and remind must be adequately portrayed. These\npictures had got to stimulate the emotions of life, first; aesthetic\nemotion was a secondary matter. A Renaissance picture was meant to say\njust those things that a patron would like to hear. That way lies the\nend of art: however wicked it may be to try to shock the public, it is\nnot so wicked as trying to please it. But whatever the Italian painters\nof the Renaissance had to say they said in the grand manner. Remember,\nwe are not Dutchmen. Therefore let all your figures suggest the\nappropriate emotion by means of the appropriate gesture--the gesture\nconsecrated by the great tradition. Straining limbs, looks of love,\nhate, envy, fear and horror, up-turned or downcast eyes, hands\noutstretched or clasped in despair--by means of our marvellous\nmachinery, and still more marvellous skill, we can give them all they\nask without forestalling the photographers. But we are not recounters\nall, for some of our patrons are poets. To them the visible Universe is\nsuggestive of moods or, at any rate, sympathetic with them. These value\nobjects for their association with the fun and folly and romance of\nlife. For them, too, we paint pictures, and in their pictures we lend\nNature enough humanity to make her interesting. My lord is lascivious?\nCorreggio will give him a background to his mood. My lord is majestic?\nMichelangelo will tell him that man is, indeed, a noble animal whose\nmuscles wriggle heroically as watch-springs. The sixteenth century\nproduced a race of artists peculiar in their feeling for material\nbeauty, but normal, coming as they do at the foot of the hills, in their\ntechnical proficiency and aesthetic indigence. Craft holds the candle\nthat betrays the bareness of the cupboard. The aesthetic significance of\nform is feebly and impurely felt, the power of creating it is lost\nalmost; but finer descriptions have rarely been painted. They knew how\nto paint in the sixteenth century: as for the primitives--God bless\nthem--they did their best: what more could they do when they couldn't\neven round a lady's thighs?\n\nThe Renaissance was a re-birth of other things besides a taste for round\nlimbs and the science of representing them; we begin to hear again of\ntwo diseases, endemic in imperial Rome, from which a lively and vigorous\nsociety keeps itself tolerably free--Rarity-hunting and Expertise. These\nparasites can get no hold on a healthy body; it is on dead and dying\nmatter that they batten and grow fat. The passion to possess what is\nscarce, and nothing else, is a disease that develops as civilisation\ngrows old and dogs it to the grave: it is saprophytic. The rarity-hunter\nmay be called a \"collector\" if by \"collector\" you do not mean one who\nbuys what pleases or moves him. Certainly, such an one is unworthy of\nthe name; he lacks the true magpie instinct. To the true collector the\nintrinsic value of a work of art is irrelevant; the reasons for which he\nprizes a picture are those for which a philatelist prizes a\npostage-stamp. To him the question \"Does this move me?\" is ludicrous:\nthe question \"Is it beautiful?\"--otiose. Though by the very tasteful\ncollector of stamps or works of art beauty is allowed to be a fair jewel\nin the crown of rarity, he would have us understand from the first that\nthe value it gives is purely adventitious and depends for its existence\non rarity. No rarity, no beauty. As for the profounder aesthetic\nsignificance, if a man were to believe in its existence he would cease\nto be a collector. The question to be asked is--\"Is this rare?\" Suppose\nthe answer favourable, there remains another--\"Is it genuine?\" If the\nwork of any particular artist is not rare, if the supply meets the\ndemand, it stands to reason that the work is of no great consequence.\nFor good art is art that fetches good prices, and good prices come of a\nlimited supply. But though it be notorious that the work of Velasquez is\ncomparatively scarce and therefore good, it has yet to be decided\nwhether the particular picture offered at fifty thousand is really the\nwork of Velasquez.\n\nEnter the Expert, whom I would distinguish from the archaeologist and\nthe critic. The archaeologist is a man with a foolish and dangerous\ncuriosity about the past: I am a bit of an archaeologist myself.\nArchaeology is dangerous because it may easily overcloud one's aesthetic\nsensibility. The archaeologist may, at any moment, begin to value a work\nof art not because it is good, but because it is old or interesting.\nThough that is less vulgar than valuing it because it is rare and\nprecious it is equally fatal to aesthetic appreciation. But so long as I\nrecognise the futility of my science, so long as I recognise that I\ncannot appreciate a work of art the better because I know when and where\nit was made, so long as I recognise that, in fact, I am at a certain\ndisadvantage in judging a sixth-century mosaic compared with a person of\nequal sensibility who knows and cares nothing about Romans and\nByzantines, so long as I recognise that art criticism and archaeology\nare two different things, I hope I may be allowed to dabble unrebuked in\nmy favourite hobby: I hope I am harmless.\n\nArt criticism, in the present state of society, seems to me a\nrespectable and possibly a useful occupation. The prejudice against\ncritics, like most prejudices, lives on fear and ignorance. It is quite\nunnecessary and rather provincial, for, in fact, critics are not very\nformidable. They are suspected of all sorts of high-handed\npractices--making and breaking reputations, running up and down, booming\nand exploiting--of which I should hardly think them capable. Popular\nopinion notwithstanding, I doubt whether critics are either omnipotent\nor utterly depraved. Indeed, I believe that some of them are not only\nblameless but even lovable characters. Those sinister but flattering\ninsinuations and open charges of corruption fade woefully when one\nconsiders how little the critic of contemporary art can hope to get for\n\"writing up\" pictures that sell for twenty or thirty guineas apiece. The\nexpert, to be sure, is exposed to some temptation, since a few of his\nwords, judiciously placed, may promote a canvas from the twenty to the\ntwenty thousand mark; but, as everyone knows, the morality of the expert\nis above suspicion. Useless as the occupation of the critic may be, it\nis probably honest; and, after all, is it more useless than all other\noccupations, save only those of creating art, producing food, drink, and\ntobacco, and bearing beautiful children?\n\nIf the collector asks me, as a critic, for my opinion of the Velasquez\nhe is about to buy, I will tell him honestly what I think of it, as a\nwork of art. I will tell him whether it moves me much or little, and I\nwill try to point out those qualities and relations of line and colour\nin which it seems to me to excel or fall short. I will try to account\nfor the degree of my aesthetic emotion. That, I conceive, is the\nfunction of the critic. But all conjectures as to the authenticity of a\nwork based on its formal significance, or even on its technical\nperfection, are extremely hazardous. It is always possible that someone\nelse was the master's match as artist and craftsman, and of that\nsomeone's work there may be an overwhelming supply. The critic may sell\nthe collector a common pup instead of the one uncatalogued specimen of\nPseudo-kuniskos; and therefore the wary collector sends for someone who\ncan furnish him with the sort of evidence of the authenticity of his\npicture that would satisfy a special juryman and confound a purchasing\ndealer. At artistic evidence he laughs noisily in half-crown periodicals\nand five-guinea tomes. Documentary evidence is what he prefers; but,\nfailing that, he will put up with a cunning concoction of dates and\nwatermarks, cabalistic signatures, craquelure, patina, chemical\nproperties of paint and medium, paper and canvas, all sorts of\ncollateral evidence, historical and biographical, and racy tricks of\nbrush or pen. It is to adduce and discuss this sort of evidence that the\nCollector calls in the Expert.\n\nAnyone whom chance or misfortune has led into the haunts of collectors\nand experts will admit that I have not exaggerated the horror of the\ndiseases that we have inherited from the Classical Renaissance. He will\nhave heard the value of a picture made to depend on the interpretation\nof a letter. He will have heard the picture discussed from every point\nof view except that of one who feels its significance. By whom was it\nmade? For whom was it made? When was it made? Where was it made? Is it\nall the work of one hand? Who paid for it? How much did he pay? Through\nwhat collections has it passed? What are the names of the figures\nportrayed? What are their histories? What the style and cut of their\ncoats, breeches, and beards? How much will it fetch at Christie's? All\nthese are questions to moot; and mooted they will be, by the hour. But\nin expert conclaves who has ever heard more than a perfunctory and silly\ncomment on the aesthetic qualities of a masterpiece?\n\nWe have seen the scholars at loggerheads over the genuineness of a\npicture in the National Gallery. The dispute rages round the\ninterpretation of certain marks in the corner of the canvas. Are they,\nor are they not, a signature? Whatever the final decision may be, the\npicture will remain unchanged; but if it can be proved that the marks\nare the signature of the disciple, it will be valueless. If the Venus of\nVelasquez should turn out to be a Spanish model by del Mazo, the great\nones who guide us and teach the people to love art will see to it, I\ntrust, that the picture is moved to a position befitting its mediocrity.\nIt is this unholy alliance between Expertise and Officialdom[18] that\nsquanders twenty thousand on an unimpeachable Frans Hals, and forty\nthousand on a Mabuse for which no minor artist will wish to take\ncredit.[19] For the money a judicious purchaser could have made one of\nthe finest collections in England. The unholy alliance has no use for\ncontemporary art. The supply is considerable and the names are not\nhistoric. Snobbery makes acceptable the portrait of a great lady, though\nit be by Boldini; and even Mr. Lavery may be welcome if he come with the\npicture of a king. But how are our ediles to know whether a picture of a\ncommoner, or of some inanimate and undistinguished object, by Degas or\nCezanne is good or bad? They need not know whether a picture by Hals is\ngood; they need only know that it is by Hals.\n\nI will not describe in any detail the end of the slope, from the\nbeginning of the seventeenth to the middle of the nineteenth century.\nThe seventeenth century is rich in individual geniuses; but they are\nindividual. The level of art is very low. The big names of El Greco,\nRembrandt, Velasquez, Vermeer, Rubens, Jordaens, Poussin, and Claude,\nWren and Bernini (as architects) stand out; had they lived in the\neleventh century they might all have been lost in a crowd of anonymous\nequals. Rembrandt, indeed, perhaps the greatest genius of them all, is a\ntypical ruin of his age. For, except in a few of his later works, his\nsense of form and design is utterly lost in a mess of rhetoric, romance,\nand chiaroscuro. It is difficult to forgive the seventeenth century for\nwhat it made of Rembrandt's genius. One great advantage over its\npredecessor it did enjoy: the seventeenth century had ceased to believe\nsincerely in the ideas of the Classical Renaissance. Painters could not\ndevote themselves to suggesting the irrelevant emotions of life because\nthey did not feel them.[20] For lack of human emotion they were driven\nback on art. They talked a great deal about Magnanimity and Nobility,\nbut they thought more of Composition. For instance, in the best works of\nNicolas Poussin, the greatest artist of the age, you will notice that\nthe human figure is treated as a shape cut out of coloured paper to be\npinned on as the composition directs. That is the right way to treat the\nhuman figure; the mistake lay in making these shapes retain the\ncharacteristic gestures of Classical rhetoric. In much the same way\nClaude treats temples and palaces, trees, mountains, harbours and lakes,\nas you may see in his superb pictures at the National Gallery. There\nthey hang, beside the Turners, that all the world may see the difference\nbetween a great artist and an after-dinner poet. Turner was so much\nexcited by his observations and his sentiments that he set them all down\nwithout even trying to co-ordinate them in a work of art: clearly he\ncould not have done so in any case. That was a cheap and spiteful\nthought that prompted the clause wherein it is decreed that his pictures\nshall hang for ever beside those of Claude. He wished to call attention\nto a difference and he has succeeded beyond his expectations: curses,\nlike hens, come home to roost.\n\nIn the eighteenth century, with its dearth of genius, we perceive more\nclearly that we are on the flats. Chardin is the one great artist.\nPainters are, for the most part, upholsterers to the nobility and\ngentry. Some fashion handsome furniture for the dining-room, others\nelegant knick-knacks for the boudoir; many are kept constantly busy\ndelineating for the respect of future generations his lordship, or her\nladyship's family. The painting of the eighteenth century is brilliant\nillustration still touched with art. For instance, in Watteau,\nCanaletto, Crome, Cotman, and Guardi there is some art, some brilliance,\nand a great deal of charming illustration. In Tiepolo there is hardly\nanything but brilliance; only when one sees his work beside that of Mr.\nSargent does one realise the presence of other qualities. In Hogarth\nthere is hardly anything but illustration; one realises the presence of\nother qualities only by remembering the work of the Hon. John Collier.\nBeside the upholsterers who work for the aristocracy there is another\nclass supported by the connoisseurs. There are the conscientious bores,\nwhose modest aim it is to paint and draw correctly in the manner of\nRaffael and Michelangelo. Their first object is to stick to the rules,\ntheir second to show some cleverness in doing so. One need not bother\nabout them.\n\nSo the power of creating is almost lost, and limners must be content to\ncopy pretty things. The twin pillars of painting in the eighteenth\ncentury were what they called \"Subject\" and \"Treatment.\" To paint a\nbeautiful picture, a boudoir picture, take a pretty woman, note those\nthings about her that a chaste and civil dinner-partner might note, and\nset them down in gay colours and masses of Chinese white: you may do the\nsame by her toilette battery, her fancy frocks, and picnic parties.\nImitate whatever is pretty and you are sure to make a pretty job of it.\nTo make a noble picture, a dining-room piece, you must take the same\nlady and invest her in a Doric chiton or diploida and himation; give her\na pocillum, a censer, a sacrificial ram, and a distant view of Tivoli;\nround your modelling, and let your brush-strokes be long and slightly\ncurved; affect sober and rather hot pigments; call the finished article\n\"Dido pouring libations to the Goddess of Love.\" To paint an exhibition\npicture, the sort preferred by the more rigid _cognoscenti_, be sure to\nmake no mark for which warrant cannot be found in Rubens, Sarto, Guido\nReni, Titian, Tintoretto, Veronese, Raffael, Michelangelo, or Trajan's\nColumn. For further information consult \"The Discourses\" of Sir Joshua\nReynolds, P.R.A., whose recipes are made palatable by a quality\ninfrequent in his dishes, luminosity.\n\nThe intellectual reaction from Classical to Romantic is duly registered\nby a change of subject. Ruins and mediaeval history come into fashion.\nFor art, which is as little concerned with the elegant bubbles of the\neighteenth century as with the foaming superabundance of the Romantic\nrevival, this change is nothing more than the swing of an irrelevant\npendulum. But the new ideas led inevitably to antiquarianism, and\nantiquarians found something extraordinarily congenial in what was\nworst in Gothic art. Obedient limners follow the wiseacres. What else is\nthere for them to follow? Stragglers from the age of reason are set down\nto trick out simpering angels. No longer permitted to stand on the laws\nof propriety or their personal dignity, they are ordered to sweeten\ntheir cold meats with as much amorous and religious sentiment as they\ncan exude. Meanwhile the new fellows, far less sincere than the old, who\nfelt nothing and said so, begin to give themselves the airs of artists.\nThese Victorians are intolerable: for now that they have lost the old\ncraft and the old tradition of taste, the pictures that they make are no\nlonger pleasantly insignificant; they bellow \"stinking mackerel.\"\n\nAbout the middle of the nineteenth century art was as nearly dead as art\ncan be. The road ran drearily through the sea-level swamps. There were,\nof course, men who felt that imitation, whether of nature or of\nanother's work, was not enough, who felt the outrage of calling the\nstaple products of the \"forties\" and \"fifties\" art; but generally they\nlacked the power to make an effective protest. Art cannot die out\nutterly; but it lay sick in caves and cellars. There were always one or\ntwo who had a right to call themselves artists: the great Ingres[21]\noverlaps Crome; Corot and Daumier overlap Ingres; and then come the\nImpressionists. But the mass of painting and sculpture had sunk to\nsomething that no intelligent and cultivated person would dream of\ncalling art. It was in those days that they invented the commodity which\nis still the staple of official exhibitions throughout Europe. You may\nsee acres of it every summer at Burlington House and in the Salon;\nindeed, you may see little else there. It does not pretend to be art. If\nthe producers mistake it for art sometimes, they do so in all innocence:\nthey have no notion of what art is. By \"art\" they mean the imitation of\nobjects, preferably pretty or interesting ones; their spokesmen have\nsaid so again and again. The sort of thing that began to do duty for\nart about 1840, and still passes muster with the lower middle class,\nwould have been inconceivable at any time between the fall of the Roman\nEmpire and the death of George IV. Even in the eighteenth century, when\nthey could not create significant form, they knew that accurate\nimitation was of no value in itself. It is not until what is still\nofficial painting and sculpture and architecture gets itself accepted as\na substitute for art, that we can say for certain that the long slope\nthat began with the Byzantine primitives is ended. But when we have\nreached this point we know that we can sink no lower.\n\nWe must mark the spot near which a huge impulse died; but we need not\nlinger in the fetid swamps--or only long enough to say a word of\njustice. Do not rail too bitterly against official painters, living or\ndead. They cannot harm art, because they have nothing to do with it:\nthey are not artists. If rail you must, rail at that public which,\nhaving lost all notion of what art is, demanded, and still demands, in\nits stead, the thing that these painters can supply. Official painting\nis the product of social conditions which have not yet passed away.\nThousands of people who care nothing about art are able to buy and are\nin the habit of buying pictures. They want a background, just as the\nladies and gentlemen of the _ancien regime_ wanted one; only their idea\nof what a background should be is different. The painter of commerce\nsupplies what is wanted and in his simplicity calls it art. That it is\nnot art, that it is not even an amenity, should not blind us to the fact\nthat it is an honest article. I admit that the man who produces it\nsatisfies a vulgar and unprofitable taste; so does the very upright\ntradesman who forces insipid asparagus for the Christmas market. Sir\nGeorgius Midas will never care for art, but he will always want a\nbackground; and, unless things are going to change with surprising\nsuddenness, it will be some time before he is unable to get what he\nwants, at a price. However splendid and vital the new movement may be,\nit will not, I fancy, unaided, kill the business of picture-making. The\ntrade will dwindle; but I suspect it will survive until there is no one\nwho can afford ostentatious upholstery, until the only purchasers are\nthose who willingly make sacrifices for the joy of possessing a work of\nart.\n\n\n\n\nIV\n\nALID EX ALIO\n\n\nIn the nineteenth century the spirit seems to enter one of those\nprodigious periods of incubation for a type of which we turn\nautomatically to the age that saw the last infirmity of Roman\nimperialism and of Hellenistic culture. About Victorian men and\nmovements there is something uneasy. It is as though, having seen a\nshilling come down \"tails,\" one were suddenly to surprise the ghost of a\nhead--you could have sworn that \"heads\" it was. It doesn't matter, but\nit's disquieting. And after all, perhaps it does matter. Seen from odd\nangles, Victorian judges and ministers take on the airs of conspirators:\nthere is something prophetic about Mr. Gladstone--about the Newcastle\nprogramme something pathetic. Respectable hypotheses are caught implying\nthe most disreputable conclusions. And yet the respectable classes\nspeculate while anarchists and supermen are merely horrified by the\ncard-playing and champagne-drinking of people richer than themselves.\nAgnostics see the finger of God in the fall of godless Paris.\nIndividualists clamour for a large and vigilant police force.\n\nThat is how the nineteenth century looks to us. Most of the mountains\nare in labour with ridiculous mice, but the spheres are shaken by storms\nin intellectual teacups. The Pre-Raffaelites call in question the whole\ntradition of the Classical Renaissance, and add a few more names to the\nheavy roll of notoriously bad painters. The French Impressionists\nprofess to do no more than push the accepted theory of representation to\nits logical conclusion, and by their practice, not only paint some\nglorious pictures, but shake the fatal tradition and remind the more\nintelligent part of the world that visual art has nothing to do with\nliterature. Whistler draws, not the whole, but a part of the true moral.\nWhat a pity he was not a greater artist! Still, he was an artist; and\nabout the year 1880 the race was almost extinct in this country.[22]\n\nThrough the fog of the nineteenth century, which began in 1830, loom\ngigantic warnings. All the great figures are ominous. If they do not\nbelong to the new order, they make impossible the old. Carlyle and\nDickens and Victor Hugo, the products and lovers of the age, scold it.\nFlaubert points a contemptuous finger. Ibsen, a primitive of the new\nworld, indicates the cracks in the walls of the old. Tolstoi is content\nto be nothing but a primitive until he becomes little better than a\nbore. By minding his own business, Darwin called in question the\nbusiness of everyone else. By hammering new sparks out of an old\ninstrument, Wagner revealed the limitations of literary music. As the\ntwentieth century dawns, a question, which up to the time of the French\nRevolution had been judiciously kept academic, shoulders its way into\npolitics: \"Why is this good?\" About the same time, thanks chiefly to the\nAesthetes and the French Impressionists, an aesthetic conscience,\ndormant since before the days of the Renaissance, wakes and begins to\ncry, \"Is this art?\"\n\nIt is amusing to remember that the first concerted clamour against the\nRenaissance and its florid sequelae arose in England; for the Romantic\nmovement, which was as much French and German as English, was merely a\nreaction from the classicism of the eighteenth century, and hardly\nattacked, much less threw off, the dominant tyranny. We have a right to\nrejoice in the Pre-Raffaelite movement as an instance of England's\nunquestioned supremacy in independence and unconventionality of thought.\nDepression begins when we have to admit that the revolt led to nothing\nbut a great many bad pictures and a little thin sentiment. The\nPre-Raffaelites were men of taste who felt the commonness of the High\nRenaissance and the distinction of what they called Primitive Art, by\nwhich they meant the art of the fifteenth and fourteenth centuries. They\nsaw that, since the Renaissance, painters had been trying to do\nsomething different from what the primitives had done; but for the life\nof them they could not see what it was that the primitives did. They had\nthe taste to prefer Giotto to Raffael, but the only genuine reason they\ncould give for their preference was that they felt Raffael to be vulgar.\nThe reason was good, but not fundamental; so they set about inventing\nothers. They discovered in the primitives scrupulous fidelity to nature,\nsuperior piety, chaste lives. How far they were from guessing the\nsecret of primitive art appeared when they began to paint pictures\nthemselves. The secret of primitive art is the secret of all art, at all\ntimes, in all places--sensibility to the profound significance of form\nand the power of creation. The band of happy brothers lacked both; so\nperhaps it is not surprising that they should have found in acts of\npiety, in legends and symbols, the material, and in sound churchmanship\nthe very essence, of mediaeval art. For their own inspiration they\nlooked to the past instead of looking about them. Instead of diving for\ntruth they sought it on the surface. The fact is, the Pre-Raffaelites\nwere not artists, but archaeologists who tried to make intelligent\ncuriosity do the work of impassioned contemplation. As artists they do\nnot differ essentially from the ruck of Victorian painters. They will\nreproduce the florid ornament of late Gothic as slavishly as the steady\nAcademician reproduces the pimples on an orange; and if they do attempt\nto simplify--some of them have noticed the simplification of the\nprimitives--they do so in the spirit, not of an artist, but of the\n\"sedulous ape.\"\n\nSimplification is the conversion of irrelevant detail into significant\nform. A very bold Pre-Raffaelite was capable of representing a meadow\nby two minutely accurate blades of grass. But two minutely accurate\nblades of grass are just as irrelevant as two million; it is the formal\nsignificance of a blade of grass or of a meadow with which the artist is\nconcerned. The Pre-Raffaelite method is at best symbolism, at worst pure\nsilliness. Had the Pre-Raffaelites been blessed with profoundly\nimaginative minds they might have recaptured the spirit of the Middle\nAges instead of imitating its least significant manifestations. But had\nthey been great artists they would not have wished to recapture\nanything. They would have invented forms for themselves or derived them\nfrom their surroundings, just as the mediaeval artists did. Great\nartists never look back.\n\nWhen art is as nearly dead as it was in the middle of the nineteenth\ncentury, scientific accuracy is judged the proper end of painting. Very\nwell, said the French Impressionists, be accurate, be scientific. At\nbest the Academic painter sets down his concepts; but the concept is not\na scientific reality; the men of science tell us that the visible\nreality of the Universe is vibrations of light. Let us represent things\nas they are--scientifically. Let us represent light. Let us paint what\nwe see, not the intellectual superstructure that we build over our\nsensations. That was the theory: and if the end of art were\nrepresentation it would be sound enough. But the end of art is not\nrepresentation, as the great Impressionists, Renoir, Degas, Manet,\nknew (two of them happily know it still) the moment they left off\narguing and bolted the studio door on that brilliant theorist, Claude\nMonet. Some of them, to be sure, turned out polychromatic charts of\ndesolating dullness--Monet towards the end, for instance. The\nNeo-Impressionists--Seurat, Signac, and Cross--have produced little\nelse. And any Impressionist, under the influence of Monet and Watteau,\nwas capable of making a poor, soft, formless thing. But more often the\nImpressionist masters, in their fantastic and quite unsuccessful pursuit\nof scientific truth, created works of art tolerable in design and\nglorious in colour. Of course this oasis in the mid-century desert\ndelighted the odd people who cared about art; they pretended at first to\nbe absorbed in the scientific accuracy of the thing, but before long\nthey realised that they were deceiving themselves, and gave up the\npretence. For they saw very clearly that these pictures differed most\nprofoundly from the anecdotic triumphs of Victorian workshops, not in\ntheir respectful attention to scientific theory, but in the fact that,\nthough they made little or no appeal to the interests of ordinary life,\nthey provoked a far more potent and profound emotion. Scientific\ntheories notwithstanding, the Impressionists provoked that emotion which\nall great art provokes--an emotion in the existence of which the bulk of\nVictorian artists and critics were, for obvious reasons, unable to\nbelieve. The virtue of these Impressionist pictures, whatever it might\nbe, depended on no reference to the outside world. What could it be?\n\"Sheer beauty,\" said the enchanted spectators. They were not far wrong.\n\nThat beauty is the one essential quality in a work of art is a doctrine\nthat has been too insistently associated with the name of Whistler, who\nis neither its first nor its last, nor its most capable, exponent--but\nonly of his age the most conspicuous. To read Whistler's _Ten o'Clock_\nwill do no one any harm, or much good. It is neither very brilliant nor\nat all profound, but it is in the right direction. Whistler is not to be\ncompared with the great controversialists any more than he is to be\ncompared with the great artists. To set _The Gentle Art_ beside _The\nDissertation on the Letters of Phalaris_, Gibbon's _Vindication_, or the\npolemics of Voltaire, would be as unjust as to hang \"Cremorne Gardens\"\nin the Arena Chapel. Whistler was not even cock of the Late Victorian\nwalk; both Oscar Wilde and Mr. Bernard Shaw were his masters in the art\nof controversy. But amongst Londoners of the \"eighties\" he is a bright\nfigure, as much alone almost in his knowledge of what art is, as in his\npower of creating it: and it is this that gives a peculiar point and\npoignance to all his quips and quarrels. There is dignity in his\nimpudence. He is using his rather obvious cleverness to fight for\nsomething dearer than vanity. He is a lonely artist, standing up and\nhitting below the belt for art. To the critics, painters, and\nsubstantial men of his age he was hateful because he was an artist; and\nbecause he knew that their idols were humbugs he was disquieting. Not\nonly did he have to suffer the grossness and malice of the most\ninsensitive pack of butchers that ever scrambled into the seat of\nauthority; he had also to know that not one of them could by any means\nbe made to understand one word that he spoke in seriousness. Overhaul\nthe English art criticism of that time, from the cloudy rhetoric of\nRuskin to the journalese of \"'Arry,\" and you will hardly find a sentence\nthat gives ground for supposing that the writer has so much as guessed\nwhat art is. \"As we have hinted, the series does not represent any\nVenice that we much care to remember; for who wants to remember the\ndegradation of what has been noble, the foulness of what has been\nfair?\"--\"'Arry\" in the _Times_. No doubt it is becoming in an artist to\nleave all criticism unanswered; it would be foolishness in a schoolboy\nto resent stuff of this sort. Whistler replied; and in his replies to\nignorance and insensibility, seasoned with malice, he is said to have\nbeen ill-mannered and caddish. He was; but in these respects he was by\nno means a match for his most reputable enemies. And ill-mannered,\nill-tempered, and almost alone, he was defending art, while they were\nflattering all that was vilest in Victorianism.\n\nAs I have tried to show in another place, it is not very difficult to\nfind a flaw in the theory that beauty is the essential quality in a work\nof art--that is, if the word \"beauty\" be used, as Whistler and his\nfollowers seem to have used it, to mean insignificant beauty. It seems\nthat the beauty about which they were talking was the beauty of a flower\nor a butterfly; now I have very rarely met a person delicately sensitive\nto art who did not agree, in the end, that a work of art moved him in a\nmanner altogether different from, and far more profound than, that in\nwhich a flower or a butterfly moved him. Therefore, if you wish to call\nthe essential quality in a work of art \"beauty\" you must be careful to\ndistinguish between the beauty of a work of art and the beauty of a\nflower, or, at any rate, between the beauty that those of us who are not\ngreat artists perceive in a work of art and that which the same people\nperceive in a flower. Is it not simpler to use different words? In any\ncase, the distinction is a real one: compare your delight in a flower or\na gem with what you feel before a great work of art, and you will find\nno difficulty, I think, in differing from Whistler.\n\nAnyone who cares more for a theory than for the truth is at liberty to\nsay that the art of the Impressionists, with their absurd notions about\nscientific representation, is a lovely fungus growing very naturally on\nthe ruins of the Christian slope. The same can hardly be said about\nWhistler, who was definitely in revolt against the theory of his age.\nFor we must never forget that accurate representation of what the grocer\nthinks he sees was the central dogma of Victorian art. It is the general\nacceptance of this view--that the accurate imitation of objects is an\nessential quality in a work of art--and the general inability to create,\nor even to recognise, aesthetic qualities, that mark the nineteenth\ncentury as the end of a slope. Except stray artists and odd amateurs,\nand you may say that in the middle of the nineteenth century art had\nceased to exist. That is the importance of the official and academic art\nof that age: it shows us that we have touched bottom. It has the\nimportance of an historical document. In the eighteenth century there\nwas still a tradition of art. Every official and academic painter, even\nat the end of the eighteenth century, whose name was known to the\ncultivated public, whose works were patronised by collectors, knew\nperfectly well that the end of art was not imitation, that forms must\nhave some aesthetic significance. Their successors in the nineteenth\ncentury did not. Even the tradition was dead. That means that generally\nand officially art was dead. We have seen it die. The Royal Academy and\nthe Salon have been made to serve their useful, historical purpose. We\nneed say no more about them. Whether those definitely artistic cliques\nof the nineteenth century, the men who made form a means to aesthetic\nemotion and not a means of stating facts and conveying ideas, the\nImpressionists and the Aesthetes, Manet and Renoir, Whistler and Conder,\n&c. &c., are to be regarded as accidental flowers blossoming on a grave\nor as portents of a new age, will depend upon the temperament of him who\nregards them.\n\nBut a sketch of the Christian slope may well end with the\nImpressionists, for Impressionist theory is a blind alley. Its only\nlogical development would be an art-machine--a machine for establishing\nvalues correctly, and determining what the eye sees scientifically,\nthereby making the production of art a mechanical certainty. Such a\nmachine, I am told, was invented by an Englishman. Now if the\npraying-machine be admittedly the last shift of senile religion, the\nvalue-finding machine may fairly be taken for the psychopomp of art. Art\nhas passed from the primitive creation of significant form to the\nhighly civilised statement of scientific fact. I think the machine,\nwhich is the intelligent and respectable end, should be preserved, if\nstill it exists, at South Kensington or in the Louvre, along with the\nearlier monuments of the Christian slope. As for that uninteresting and\ndisreputable end, official nineteenth-century art, it can be studied in\na hundred public galleries and in annual exhibitions all over the world.\nIt is the mouldy and therefore the obvious end. The spirit that came to\nbirth with the triumph of art over Graeco-Roman realism dies with the\nousting of art by the picture of commerce.\n\nBut if the Impressionists, with their scientific equipment, their\nastonishing technique, and their intellectualism, mark the end of one\nera, do they not rumour the coming of another? Certainly to-day there is\nstress in the cryptic laboratory of Time. A great thing is dead; but, as\nthat sagacious Roman noted:\n\n     \"haud igitur penitus pereunt quaecumque videntur, quando alid ex\n     alio reficit natura nec ullam rem gigni patitur nisi morte adiuta\n     aliena.\"\n\nAnd do not the Impressionists, with their power of creating works of art\nthat stand on their own feet, bear in their arms a new age? For if the\nvenial sin of Impressionism is a grotesque theory and its justification\na glorious practice, its historical importance consists in its having\ntaught people to seek the significance of art in the work itself,\ninstead of hunting for it in the emotions and interests of the outer\nworld.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 10: I am not being so stupid as to suggest that in the sixth\ncentury the Hellenistic influence died. It persisted for another 300\nyears at least. In sculpture and ivory carving it was only ousted by the\nRomanesque movement of the eleventh century. Inevitably a great deal of\nHellenistic stuff continued to be produced after the rise of Byzantine\nart. For how many years after the maturity of Cezanne will painters\ncontinue to produce chromophotographs? Hundreds perhaps. For all that,\nCezanne marks a change--the birth of a movement if not of a slope.]\n\n[Footnote 11: It will be found instructive to study cases 10-14 of\nenamels and metal-work at South Kensington. The tyro will have no\ndifficulty in \"spotting\" the German and Rheinish productions. Alas! the\nonly possible mistake would be a confusion between German and English.\nCertainly the famous Gloucester candlestick (1100) is as common as\nanything in the place, unless it be the even more famous Cologne\nReliquary (1170).]\n\n[Footnote 12: Patriots can take pleasure in the study of Saxon\nsculpture.]\n\n[Footnote 13: Several schools of painting and drawing flourished during\nthese centuries in Italy and north of the Alps. In S. Clemente alone it\nis easy to discover the work of two distinct periods between 600 and\n900. The extant examples of both are superb.]\n\n[Footnote 14: _The Making of Western Europe_: C.L.R. Fletcher.]\n\n[Footnote 15: Throughout the whole primitive and middle period, however,\ntwo tendencies are distinguishable--one vital, derived from\nConstantinople, the other, dead and swollen, from imperial Rome. Up to\nthe thirteenth century the Byzantine influence is easily predominant. I\nhave often thought that an amusing book might be compiled in which the\ntwo tendencies would be well distinguished and illustrated. In Pisa and\nits neighbourhood the author will find a surfeit of Romanised\nprimitives.]\n\n[Footnote 16: Pietro is, of course, nearer to Giotto.]\n\n[Footnote 17: Owing to the English invention of \"Perpendicular,\" the\nleast unsatisfactory style of Gothic architecture, the English find it\nhard to realise the full horrors of late Gothic.]\n\n[Footnote 18: In speaking of officialdom it is not the directors of\ngalleries and departments whom I have in mind. Many of them are on the\nright side; we should all be delighted to see Sir Charles Holroyd or Mr.\nMaclagan, for instances, let loose amongst the primitives with forty\nthousand pounds in pocket. I am thinking of those larger luminaries who\nset their important faces against the acquisition of works of art, the\nmen who have been put in authority over directors and the rest of us.]\n\n[Footnote 19: The Mabuse, however, was a bargain that the merchants and\nmoney-lenders who settle these things could hardly be expected to\nresist. The ticket price is said to have been L120,000.]\n\n[Footnote 20: It was Mr. Roger Fry who made this illuminating\ndiscovery.]\n\n[Footnote 21: It is pleasant to remember that by the painters, critics,\nand rich amateurs of \"the old gang\" the pictures of Ingres were treated\nas bad jokes. Ingres was accused of distortion, ugliness, and even of\nincompetence! His work was called \"mad\" and \"puerile.\" He was derided as\na pseudo-primitive, and hated as one who would subvert the great\ntradition by trying to put back the clock four hundred years. The same\nauthorities discovered in 1824 that Constable's _Hay Wain_ was the\noutcome of a sponge full of colour having been thrown at a canvas. _Nous\navons change tout ca._]\n\n[Footnote 22: As Mr. Walter Sickert reminds me, there was Sickert.]\n\n\n\n\n                IV\n\n            THE MOVEMENT\n\n\n     I. THE DEBT TO CEZANNE\n\n    II. SIMPLIFICATION AND DESIGN\n\n   III. THE PATHETIC FALLACY\n\n\n  [Illustration: CEZANNE\n  _Photo, Druet_]\n\n\n\n\nI\n\nTHE DEBT TO CEZANNE\n\n\nThat with the maturity of Cezanne a new movement came to birth will\nhardly be disputed by anyone who has managed to survive the \"nineties\";\nthat this movement is the beginning of a new slope is a possibility\nworth discussing, but about which no decided opinion can yet be held. In\nso far as one man can be said to inspire a whole age, Cezanne inspires\nthe contemporary movement: he stands a little apart, however, because he\nis too big to take a place in any scheme of historical development; he\nis one of those figures that dominate an age and are not to be fitted\ninto any of the neat little pigeon-holes so thoughtfully prepared for us\nby evolutionists. He passed through the greater part of life unnoticed,\nand came near creeping out of it undiscovered. No one seems to have\nguessed at what was happening. It is easy now to see how much we owe to\nhim, and how little he owed to anyone; for us it is easy to see what\nGaugin and Van Gogh borrowed--in 1890, the year in which the latter\ndied, it was not so. They were sharp eyes, indeed, that discerned before\nthe dawn of the new century that Cezanne had founded a movement.\n\nThat movement is still young. But I think it would be safe to say that\nalready it has produced as much good art as its predecessor. Cezanne, of\ncourse, created far greater things than any Impressionist painter; and\nGaugin, Van Gogh, Matisse, Rousseau, Picasso, de Vlaminck, Derain,\nHerbin, Marchand, Marquet, Bonnard, Duncan Grant, Maillol, Lewis,\nKandinsky, Brancuzi, von Anrep, Roger Fry, Friesz, Goncharova, L'Hote,\nare Rolands for the Olivers of any other artistic period.[23] They are\nnot all great artists, but they all are artists. If the Impressionists\nraised the proportion of works of art in the general pictorial output\nfrom about one in five hundred thousand to one in a hundred thousand,\nthe Post-Impressionists (for after all it is sensible to call the group\nof vital artists who immediately follow the Impressionists by that\nname) have raised the average again. To-day, I daresay, it stands as\nhigh as one in ten thousand. Indeed, it is this that has led some people\nto see in the new movement the dawn of a new age; for nothing is more\ncharacteristic of a \"primitive\" movement than the frequent and\nwidespread production of genuine art. Another hopeful straw at which the\nsanguine catch is the admirable power of development possessed by the\nnew inspiration. As a rule, the recognition of a movement as a movement\nis its death. As soon as the pontiffs discovered Impressionism, some\ntwenty years after its patent manifestation, they academized it. They\nset their faces against any sort of development and drove into revolt or\nartistic suicide every student with an ounce of vitality in him. Before\nthe inspiration of Cezanne had time to grow stale, it was caught up by\nsuch men as Matisse and Picasso; by them it was moulded into forms that\nsuited their different temperaments, and already it shows signs of\ntaking fresh shape to express the sensibility of a younger\ngeneration.[24]\n\nThis is very satisfactory but it does not suffice to prove that the new\nmovement is the beginning of a new slope; it does not prove that we\nstand now where the early Byzantines stood, with the ruins of a\ncivilisation clattering about our ears and our eyes set on a new\nhorizon. In favour of that view there are no solid arguments; yet are\nthere general considerations, worth stating and pondering, though not to\nbe pushed too violently. He who would cast the horoscope of humanity, or\nof any human activity, must neither neglect history nor trust her\novermuch. Certainly the neglect of history is the last mistake into\nwhich a modern speculator is likely to fall. To compare Victorian\nEngland with Imperial Rome has been the pastime of the half-educated\nthese fifty years. \"_Tu regere imperio populos, Romane, memento_,\" is\nabout as much Latin as it is becoming in a public schoolman to remember.\nThe historically minded should travel a little further with their\ncomparison (to be sure, some have done so in search of arguments against\nSocialism), on their way, they will not have failed to remark the\nmaterialism, the mechanical cunning, the high standard of comfort, the\nlow standard of honesty, the spiritual indigence, the unholy alliance of\ncynicism with sentimentality, the degradation of art and religion to\nmenial and mountebank offices, common in both, and in both signifying\nthe mouldy end of what was once a vital agitation. To similise the state\nsuperstitions and observances of Rome with our official devotions and\nministration, the precise busts in the British Museum with the \"speaking\nlikenesses\" in the National Portrait Gallery, the academic republicanism\nof the cultivated patricians with English Liberalism, and the thrills of\nthe arena with those of the playing-field, would be pretty sport for any\nlittle German boy. I shall not encourage the brat to lay an historical\nfinger on callousness, bravado, trembling militarism, superficial\nculture, mean political passion, megalomania, and a taste for being in\nthe majority as attributes common to Imperial Rome and Imperial England.\nRather I will inquire whether the rest of Europe does not labour under\nthe proverbial disability of those who live in glass-houses. It is not\nso much English politics as Western civilisation that reminds me of the\nlast days of the Empire.\n\nThe facility of the comparison disfavours the raking up of\nsimilarities; I need not compare Mr. Shaw with Lucian or the persecution\nof Christians with the savage out-bursts of our shopkeepers against\nanarchists. One may note, though, that it is as impossible to determine\nexactly when and whence came the religious spirit that was to make an\nend of Graeco-Roman materialism as to assign a birth-place to the\nspiritual ferment that pervades modern Europe. For though we may find a\ndate for the maturity of Cezanne, and though I agree that the art of one\ngenius may produce a movement, even Cezanne will hardly suffice to\naccount for what looks like the beginning of an artistic slope and a\nrenaissance of the human spirit. One would hesitate to explain the dark\nand middle ages by the mosaics at Ravenna. The spirit that was to revive\nthe moribund Roman world came from the East; that we know. It was at\nwork long before the world grew conscious of its existence. Its remotest\norigins are probably undiscoverable. To-day we can name pioneers, beside\nCezanne, in the new world of emotion; there was Tolstoi, and there was\nIbsen; but who can say that these did not set out in search of Eldorados\nof which already they had heard travellers' tales. Ruskin shook his\nfist at the old order to some purpose; and, if he could not see clearly\nwhat things counted, succeeded at least in making contemptible some that\ndid not. Nietzsche's preposterous nonsense knocked the bottom out of\nnonsense more preposterous and far more vile. But to grub for origins is\nnone of my business; when the Church shall be established be sure that\nindustrious hagiographers will do justice to its martyrs and\nmissionaries.\n\nConsider, too, that a great emotional renaissance must be preceded by an\nintellectual, destructive movement. To that how shall we assign a\nstarting-point? It could be argued, I suppose, that it began with\nVoltaire and the Encyclopaedists. Having gone so far back, the historian\nwould find cause for going further still. How could he justify any\nfrontier? Every living organism is said to carry in itself the germ of\nits own decay, and perhaps a civilisation is no sooner alive than it\nbegins to contrive its end. Gradually the symptoms of disease become\napparent to acute physicians who state the effect without perceiving the\ncause. Be it so; circular fatalism is as cheerful as it is sad. If ill\nmust follow good, good must follow ill. In any case, I have said enough\nto show that if Europe be again at the head of a pass, if we are about\nto take the first step along a new slope, the historians of the new age\nwill have plenty to quarrel about.\n\nIt may be because the nineteenth century was preparing Europe for a new\nepoch, that it understood better its destructive critics than its\nconstructive artists. At any rate before that century ended it had\nproduced one of the great constructive artists of the world, and\noverlooked him. Whether or no he marks the beginning of a slope, Cezanne\ncertainly marks the beginning of a movement the main characteristics of\nwhich it will be my business to describe. For, though there is some\nabsurdity in distinguishing one artistic movement from another, since\nall works of art, to whatever age they belong, are essentially the same;\nyet these superficial differences which are the characteristics of a\nmovement have an importance beyond that dubious one of assisting\nhistorians. The particular methods of creating form, and the particular\nkinds of form affected by the artists of one generation, have an\nimportant bearing on the art of the next. For whereas the methods and\nforms of one may admit of almost infinite development, the methods and\nforms of another may admit of nothing but imitation. For instance, the\nfifteenth century movement that began with Masaccio, Uccello, and\nCastagno opened up a rich vein of rather inferior ore; whereas the\nschool of Raffael was a blind alley. Cezanne discovered methods and\nforms which have revealed a vista of possibilities to the end of which\nno man can see; on the instrument that he invented thousands of artists\nyet unborn may play their own tunes.\n\nWhat the future will owe to Cezanne we cannot guess: what contemporary\nart owes to him it would be hard to compute. Without him the artists of\ngenius and talent who to-day delight us with the significance and\noriginality of their work might have remained port-bound for ever,\nill-discerning their objective, wanting chart, rudder, and compass.\nCezanne is the Christopher Columbus of a new continent of form. In 1839\nhe was born at Aix-en-Provence, and for forty years he painted patiently\nin the manner of his master Pissarro. To the eyes of the world he\nappeared, so far as he appeared at all, a respectable, minor\nImpressionist, an admirer of Manet, a friend, if not a protege, of\nZola, a loyal, negligible disciple. He was on the right side, of\ncourse--the Impressionist side, the side of the honest, disinterested\nartists, against the academic, literary pests. He believed in painting.\nHe believed that it could be something better than an expensive\nsubstitute for photography or an accompaniment to poor poetry. So in\n1870 he was for science against sentimentality.\n\nBut science will neither make nor satisfy an artist: and perhaps Cezanne\nsaw what the great Impressionists could not see, that though they were\nstill painting exquisite pictures their theories had led art into a _cul\nde sac_. So while he was working away in his corner of Provence, shut\noff completely from the aestheticism of Paris, from Baudelairism and\nWhistlerism, Cezanne was always looking for something to replace the bad\nscience of Claude Monet. And somewhere about 1880 he found it. At\nAix-en-Provence came to him a revelation that has set a gulf between the\nnineteenth century and the twentieth: for, gazing at the familiar\nlandscape, Cezanne came to understand it, not as a mode of light, nor\nyet as a player in the game of human life, but as an end in itself and\nan object of intense emotion. Every great artist has seen landscape as\nan end in itself--as pure form, that is to say; Cezanne has made a\ngeneration of artists feel that compared with its significance as an end\nin itself all else about a landscape is negligible. From that time\nforward Cezanne set himself to create forms that would express the\nemotion that he felt for what he had learnt to see. Science became as\nirrelevant as subject. Everything can be seen as pure form, and behind\npure form lurks the mysterious significance that thrills to ecstasy. The\nrest of Cezanne's life is a continuous effort to capture and express the\nsignificance of form.\n\nI have tried to say in another place that there are more roads than one\nby which a man may come at reality. Some artists seem to have come at it\nby sheer force of imagination, unaided by anything without them; they\nhave needed no material ladder to help them out of matter. They have\nspoken with reality as mind to mind, and have passed on the message in\nforms which owe nothing but bare existence to the physical universe. Of\nthis race are the best musicians and architects; of this race is not\nCezanne. He travelled towards reality along the traditional road of\nEuropean painting. It was in what he saw that he discovered a sublime\narchitecture haunted by that Universal which informs every Particular.\nHe pushed further and further towards a complete revelation of the\nsignificance of form, but he needed something concrete as a point of\ndeparture. It was because Cezanne could come at reality only through\nwhat he saw that he never invented purely abstract forms. Few great\nartists have depended more on the model. Every picture carried him a\nlittle further towards his goal--complete expression; and because it was\nnot the making of pictures but the expression of his sense of the\nsignificance of form that he cared about, he lost interest in his work\nso soon as he had made it express as much as he had grasped. His own\npictures were for Cezanne nothing but rungs in a ladder at the top of\nwhich would be complete expression. The whole of his later life was a\nclimbing towards an ideal. For him every picture was a means, a step, a\nstick, a hold, a stepping-stone--something he was ready to discard as\nsoon as it had served his purpose. He had no use for his own pictures.\nTo him they were experiments. He tossed them into bushes, or left them\nin the open fields to be stumbling-blocks for a future race of luckless\ncritics.\n\nCezanne is a type of the perfect artist; he is the perfect antithesis\nof the professional picture-maker, or poem-maker, or music-maker. He\ncreated forms because only by so doing could he accomplish the end of\nhis existence--the expression of his sense of the significance of form.\nWhen we are talking about aesthetics, very properly we brush all this\naside, and consider only the object and its emotional effect on us; but\nwhen we are trying to explain the emotional effectiveness of pictures we\nturn naturally to the minds of the men who made them, and find in the\nstory of Cezanne an inexhaustible spring of suggestion. His life was a\nconstant effort to create forms that would express what he felt in the\nmoment of inspiration. The notion of uninspired art, of a formula for\nmaking pictures, would have appeared to him preposterous. The real\nbusiness of his life was not to make pictures, but to work out his own\nsalvation. Fortunately for us he could only do this by painting. Any two\npictures by Cezanne are bound to differ profoundly. He never dreamed of\nrepeating himself. He could not stand still. That is why a whole\ngeneration of otherwise dissimilar artists have drawn inspiration from\nhis work. That is why it implies no disparagement of any living artist\nwhen I say that the prime characteristic of the new movement is its\nderivation from Cezanne.\n\nThe world into which Cezanne tumbled was a world still agitated by the\nquarrels of Romantics and Realists. The quarrel between Romance and\nRealism is the quarrel of people who cannot agree as to whether the\nhistory of Spain or the number of pips is the more important thing about\nan orange. The Romantics and Realists were deaf men coming to blows\nabout the squeak of a bat. The instinct of a Romantic invited to say\nwhat he felt about anything was to recall its associations. A rose, for\ninstance, made him think of old gardens and young ladies and Edmund\nWaller and sundials, and a thousand quaint and gracious things that, at\none time or another, had befallen him or someone else. A rose touched\nlife at a hundred pretty points. A rose was interesting because it had a\npast. \"Bosh,\" said the Realist, \"I will tell you what a rose is; that is\nto say, I will give you a detailed account of the properties of _Rosa\nsetigera_, not forgetting to mention the urn-shaped calyx-tube, the five\nimbricated lobes, or the open corolla of five obovate petals.\" To a\nCezanne one account would appear as irrelevant as the other, since both\nomit the thing that matters--what philosophers used to call \"the thing\nin itself,\" what now, I imagine, they call \"the essential reality.\" For,\nafter all, what is a rose? What is a tree, a dog, a wall, a boat? What\nis the particular significance of anything? Certainly the essence of a\nboat is not that it conjures up visions of argosies with purple sails,\nnor yet that it carries coals to Newcastle. Imagine a boat in complete\nisolation, detach it from man and his urgent activities and fabulous\nhistory, what is it that remains, what is that to which we still react\nemotionally? What but pure form, and that which, lying behind pure form,\ngives it its significance. It was for this Cezanne felt the emotion he\nspent his life in expressing. And the second characteristic of the new\nmovement is a passionate interest, inherited from Cezanne, in things\nregarded as ends in themselves. In saying this I am saying no more than\nthat the painters of the movement are consciously determined to be\nartists. Peculiarity lies in the consciousness--the consciousness with\nwhich they set themselves to eliminate all that lies between themselves\nand the pure forms of things. To be an artist, they think, suffices.\nHow many men of talent, and even of genius, have missed being effective\nartists because they tried to be something else?\n\n\n\n\nII\n\nSIMPLIFICATION AND DESIGN\n\n\nAt the risk of becoming a bore I repeat that there is something\nludicrous about hunting for characteristics in the art of to-day or of\nyesterday, or of any particular period. In art the only important\ndistinction is the distinction between good art and bad. That this pot\nwas made in Mesopotamia about 4000 B.C., and that picture in Paris about\n1913 A.D., is of very little consequence. Nevertheless, it is possible,\nthough not very profitable, to distinguish between equally good works\nmade at different times in different places; and although the practice\nof associating art with the age in which it was produced can be of no\nservice to art or artists, I am not sure that it can be of no service\nwhatever. For if it be true that art is an index to the spiritual\ncondition of an age, the historical consideration of art cannot fail to\nthrow some light on the history of civilisation. It is conceivable\ntherefore that a comparative study of artistic periods might lead us to\nmodify our conception of human development, and to revise a few of our\nsocial and political theories. Be that as it may, this much is sure:\nshould anyone wish to infer from the art it produced the civility of an\nage, he must be capable of distinguishing the work of that age from the\nwork of all other ages. He must be familiar with the characteristics of\nthe movement. It is my intention to indicate a few of the more obvious\ncharacteristics of the contemporary movement.\n\nBut how comes it that the art of one age differs from that of another?\nAt first sight it seems odd that art, which is the expression of man's\nsense of the significance of form, should vary even superficially from\nage to age. Yet, deeply considered, it is as certain that superficially\nart will always be changing as that essentially it cannot change. It\nseems that the ape-instinct in man is so strong that unless he were\ncontinually changing he would cease to create and merely imitate. It is\nthe old question of the artistic problem. Only by setting himself new\nproblems can the artist raise his powers to the white heat of creation.\nThe forms in which artists can express themselves are infinite, and\ntheir desire to express themselves keeps up a constant change and\nreaction in artistic form. Not only is there something of the ancestral\nape in man, there is something of the ancestral sheep; there are\nfashions in forms and colours and the relations of forms and colours;\nor, to put the matter more pleasantly, and more justly, there is\nsufficient accord in the sensibilities of an age to induce a certain\nsimilarity of forms. It seems as though there were strange powers in the\nair from which no man can altogether escape; we call them by pet\nnames--\"Movements,\" \"Forces,\" \"Tendencies,\" \"Influences,\" \"The Spirit of\nthe Age\"--but we never understand them. They are neither to be\nfrightened nor cajoled by our airs of familiarity, which impress the\npublic only. They exist, however, and if they did not we should have to\ninvent them; for how else are we to explain the fact that not only do\nthe artists of a particular period affect particular kinds of form, but\nthat even the spectators of each new generation seem to be born with\nsensibilities specially apt to be flattered by them. In this age it is\npossible to take refuge under the magic word \"Cezanne\"; we can say that\nCezanne has imposed his forms on Georgian painters and public, just as\nWagner imposed his on Edwardian musicians and concert-goers. This\nexplanation seems to me inadequate; and in any case it will not account\nfor the predominance of formal fashions in ages undominated by any\nmasterful genius. The spirit of an artistic age is, I suspect, a\ncomposition that defies complete analysis; the work of one great mind is\ngenerally one part of it, the monuments of some particular past age are\noften another. Technical discoveries have sometimes led to artistic\nchanges. For instance, to men who have been in the habit of painting on\nwood, the invention of canvas would suggest all sorts of fascinating\nnovelties. Lastly, there is a continual change in the appearance of\nthose familiar objects which are the raw material of most visual\nartists. So, though the essential quality--significance--is constant, in\nthe choice of forms there is perpetual change; and these changes seem to\nmove in long flights or shorter jumps, so that we are able, with some\nprecision, to lay our fingers on two points between which there is a\ncertain amount of art possessing certain common characteristics. That\nwhich lies between two such points historians call a period or movement.\n\nThe period in which we find ourselves in the year 1913 begins with the\nmaturity of Cezanne (about 1885). It therefore overlaps the\nImpressionist movement, which certainly had life in it till the end of\nthe nineteenth century. Whether Post-Impressionism will peter out as\nImpressionism has done, or whether it is the first flowering of a new\nartistic vitality with centuries of development before it, is, I have\nadmitted, a matter of conjecture. What seems to me certain is that those\nwho shall be able to contemplate our age as something complete, as a\nperiod in the history of art, will not so much as know of the existence\nof the artisans still amongst us who create illusions and chaffer and\nquarrel in the tradition of the Victorians. When they think of the early\ntwentieth-century painters they will think only of the artists who tried\nto create form--the artisans who tried to create illusions will be\nforgotten. They will think of the men who looked to the present, not of\nthose who looked to the past; and, therefore, it is of them alone that\nI shall think when I attempt to describe the contemporary movement.[25]\n\nAlready I have suggested two characteristics of the movement; I have\nsaid that in their choice of forms and colours most vital contemporary\nartists are, more or less, influenced by Cezanne, and that Cezanne has\ninspired them with the resolution to free their art from literary and\nscientific irrelevancies. Most people, asked to mention a third, would\npromptly answer, I suspect--Simplification. To instance simplification\nas a peculiarity of the art of any particular age seems queer, since\nsimplification is essential to all art. Without it art cannot exist; for\nart is the creation of significant form, and simplification is the\nliberating of what is significant from what is not. Yet to such depths\nhad art sunk in the nineteenth century, that in the eyes of the rabble\nthe greatest crime of Whistler and the Impressionists was their by no\nmeans drastic simplification. And we are not yet clear of the Victorian\nslough. The spent dip stinks on into the dawn. You have only to look at\nalmost any modern building to see masses of elaboration and detail that\nform no part of any real design and serve no useful purpose. Nothing\nstands in greater need of simplification than architecture, and nowhere\nis simplification more dreaded and detested than amongst architects.\nWalk the streets of London; everywhere you will see huge blocks of\nready-made decoration, pilasters and porticoes, friezes and facades,\nhoisted on cranes to hang from ferro-concrete walls. Public buildings\nhave become public laughing-stocks. They are as senseless as slag-heaps,\nand far less beautiful. Only where economy has banished the architect do\nwe see masonry of any merit. The engineers, who have at least a\nscientific problem to solve, create, in factories and railway-bridges,\nour most creditable monuments. They at least are not ashamed of their\nconstruction, or, at any rate, they are not allowed to smother it in\nbeauty at thirty shillings a foot. We shall have no more architecture in\nEurope till architects understand that all these tawdry excrescences\nhave got to be simplified away, till they make up their minds to express\nthemselves in the materials of the age--steel, concrete, and glass--and\nto create in these admirable media vast, simple, and significant forms.\n\nThe contemporary movement has pushed simplification a great deal further\nthan Manet and his friends pushed it, thereby distinguishing itself from\nanything we have seen since the twelfth century. Since the twelfth\ncentury, in sculpture and glass, the thirteenth, in painting and\ndrawing, the drift has been towards realism and away from art. Now the\nessence of realism is detail. Since Zola, every novelist has known that\nnothing gives so imposing an air of reality as a mass of irrelevant\nfacts, and very few have cared to give much else. Detail is the heart of\nrealism, and the fatty degeneration of art. The tendency of the movement\nis to simplify away all this mess of detail which painters have\nintroduced into pictures in order to state facts. But more than this was\nneeded. There were irrelevancies introduced into pictures for other\npurposes than that of statement. There were the irrelevancies of\ntechnical swagger. Since the twelfth century there has been a steady\nelaboration of technical complexities. Writers with nothing to say soon\ncome to regard the manipulation of words as an end in itself. So cooks\nwithout eggs might come to regard the ritual of omelette-making, the\nmixing of condiments, the chopping of herbs, the stoking of fires, and\nthe shaping of white caps, as a fine art. As for the eggs,--why that's\nGod business: and who wants omelettes when he can have cooking? The\nmovement has simplified the _batterie de cuisine_. Nothing is to be left\nin a work of art which merely shows that the craftsman knows how to put\nit there.\n\nAlas! It generally turns out that Life and Art are rather more\ncomplicated than we could wish; to understand exactly what is meant by\nsimplification we must go deeper into the mysteries. It is easy to say\neliminate irrelevant details. What details are not irrelevant? In a work\nof art nothing is relevant but what contributes to formal significance.\nTherefore all informatory matter is irrelevant and should be eliminated.\nBut what most painters have to express can only be expressed in designs\nso complex and subtle that without some clue they would be almost\nunintelligible. For instance, there are many designs that can only be\ngrasped by a spectator who looks at them from a particular point of\nview. Not every picture is as good seen upside down as upside up. To be\nsure, very sensitive people can always discover from the design itself\nhow it should be viewed, and, without much difficulty, will place\ncorrectly a piece of lace or embroidery in which there is no informatory\nclue to guide them. Nevertheless, when an artist makes an intricate\ndesign it is tempting and, indeed, reasonable, for him to wish to\nprovide a clue; and to do so he has only to work into his design some\nfamiliar object, a tree or a figure, and the business is done. Having\nestablished a number of extremely subtle relations between highly\ncomplex forms, he may ask himself whether anyone else will be able to\nappreciate them. Shall he not give a hint as to the nature of his\norganisation, and ease the way for our aesthetic emotions? If he give to\nhis forms so much of the appearance of the forms of ordinary life that\nwe shall at once refer them back to something we have already seen,\nshall we not grasp more easily their aesthetic relations in his design?\nEnter by the back-door representation in the quality of a clue to the\nnature of design. I have no objection to its presence. Only, if the\nrepresentative element is not to ruin the picture as a work of art, it\nmust be fused into the design. It must do double duty; as well as\ngiving information, it must create aesthetic emotion. It must be\nsimplified into significant form.\n\nLet us make no mistake about this. To help the spectator to appreciate\nour design we have introduced into our picture a representative or\ncognitive element. This element has nothing whatever to do with art. The\nrecognition of a correspondence between the forms of a work of art and\nthe familiar forms of life cannot possibly provoke aesthetic emotion.\nOnly significant form can do that. Of course realistic forms may be\naesthetically significant, and out of them an artist may create a superb\nwork of art, but it is with their aesthetic and not with their cognitive\nvalue that we shall then be concerned. We shall treat them as though\nthey were not representative of anything. The cognitive or\nrepresentative element in a work of art can be useful as a means to the\nperception of formal relations and in no other way. It is valuable to\nthe spectator, but it is of no value to the work of art; or rather it is\nvaluable to the work of art as an ear-trumpet is valuable to one who\nwould converse with the deaf: the speaker could do as well without it,\nthe listener could not. The representative element may help the\nspectator; it can do the picture no good and it may do harm. It may ruin\nthe design; that is to say, it may deprive the picture of its value as a\nwhole; and it is as a whole, as an organisation of forms, that a work of\nart provokes the most tremendous emotions.\n\nFrom the point of view of the spectator the Post-Impressionists have\nbeen particularly happy in their simplification. As we know, a design\ncan be composed just as well of realistic forms as of invented; but a\nfine design composed of realistic forms runs a great risk of being\naesthetically underrated. We are so immediately struck by the\nrepresentative element that the formal significance passes us by. It is\nvery hard at first sight to appreciate the design of a picture by a\nhighly realistic artist--Ingres, for instance; our aesthetic emotions\nare overlaid by our human curiosity. We do not see the figures as forms,\nbecause we immediately think of them as people. On the other hand, a\ndesign composed of purely imaginary forms, without any cognitive clue\n(say a Persian carpet), if it be at all elaborate and intricate, is apt\nto non-plus the less sensitive spectators. Post-Impressionists, by\nemploying forms sufficiently distorted to disconcert and baffle human\ninterest and curiosity yet sufficiently representative to call immediate\nattention to the nature of the design, have found a short way to our\naesthetic emotions. This does not make Post-Impressionist pictures\nbetter or worse than others; it makes them more easily appreciable as\nworks of art. Probably it will always be difficult for the mass of men\nto consider pictures as works of art, but it will be less difficult for\nthem so to consider Post-Impressionist than realistic pictures; while,\nif they ceased to consider objects unprovided with representative clues\n(_e.g._ some oriental textiles) as historical monuments, they would find\nit very difficult to consider them at all.\n\nTo assure his design, the artist makes it his first care to simplify.\nBut mere simplification, the elimination of detail, is not enough. The\ninformatory forms that remain have got to be made significant. The\nrepresentative element, if it is not to injure the design, must become a\npart of it; besides giving information it has got to provoke aesthetic\nemotion. That is where symbolism fails. The symbolist eliminates, but\ndoes not assimilate. His symbols, as a rule, are not significant forms,\nbut formal intelligencers. They are not integral parts of a plastic\nconception, but intellectual abbreviations. They are not informed by the\nartist's emotion, they are invented by his intellect. They are dead\nmatter in a living organism. They are rigid and tight because they are\nnot traversed by the rhythm of the design. The explanatory legends that\nillustrators used to produce from the mouths of their characters are not\nmore foreign to visual art than the symbolic forms with which many able\ndraughtsmen have ruined their designs. In the famous \"Melancholia,\" and,\nto some extent, in a few other engravings--\"St. Eustace,\" for instance,\nand \"The Virgin and Child\" (B. 34. British Museum),--Duerer has managed\nto convert a mass of detail into tolerably significant form; but in the\ngreater part of his work (_e.g._ \"The Knight,\" \"St. Jerome\") fine\nconception is hopelessly ruined by a mass of undigested symbolism.\n\nEvery form in a work of art has, then, to be made aesthetically\nsignificant; also every form has to be made a part of a significant\nwhole. For, as generally happens, the value of the parts combined\ninto a whole is far greater than the value of the sum of the parts.\nThis organisation of forms into a significant whole is called Design;\nand an insistence--an exaggerated insistence some will say--on design\nis the fourth characteristic of the Contemporary Movement. This\ninsistence, this conviction that a work should not be good on the whole,\nbut as a whole, is, no doubt, in part a reaction from the rather too\neasy virtue of some of the Impressionists, who were content to cover\ntheir canvases with charming forms and colours, not caring overmuch\nwhether or how they were co-ordinated. Certainly this was a weakness in\nImpressionism--though by no means in all the Impressionist masters--for\nit is certain that the profoundest emotions are provoked by significant\ncombinations of significant forms. Also, it seems certain that only in\nthese organised combinations can the artist express himself completely.\n\nIt seems that an artist creates a good design when, having been\npossessed by a real emotional conception, he is able to hold and\ntranslate it. We all agree, I think, that till the artist has had his\nmoment of emotional vision there can be no very considerable work of\nart; but, the vision seen and felt, it still remains uncertain whether\nhe has the force to hold and the skill to translate it. Of course the\nvast majority of pictures fail in design because they correspond to no\nemotional vision; but the interesting failures are those in which the\nvision came but was incompletely grasped. The painters who have failed\nfor want of technical skill to set down what they have felt and mastered\ncould be counted on the fingers of one hand--if, indeed, there are any\nto be counted. But on all sides we see interesting pictures in which the\nholes in the artist's conception are obvious. The vision was once\nperfect, but it cannot be recaptured. The rapture will not return. The\nsupreme creative power is wanting. There are holes, and they have to be\nfilled with putty. Putty we all know when we see it--when we feel it. It\nis dead matter--literal transcriptions from nature, intellectual\nmachinery, forms that correspond with nothing that was apprehended\nemotionally, forms unfired with the rhythm that thrilled through the\nfirst vision of a significant whole.\n\nThere is an absolute necessity about a good design arising, I imagine,\nfrom the fact that the nature of each form and its relation to all the\nother forms is determined by the artist's need of expressing exactly\nwhat he felt. Of course, a perfect correspondence between expression and\nconception may not be established at the first or the second attempt.\nBut if the work is to be a success there will come a moment in which the\nartist will be able to hold and express completely his hour or minute of\ninspiration. If that moment does not come the design will lack\nnecessity. For though an artist's aesthetic sense enables him, as we\nshall see, to say whether a design is right or wrong, only this\nmasterful power of seizing and holding his vision enables him to make it\nright. A bad design lacks cohesion; a good design possesses it; if I\nconjecture that the secret of cohesion is the complete realisation of\nthat thrill which comes to an artist when he conceives his work as a\nwhole, I shall not forget that it is a conjecture. But it is not\nconjecture to say that when we call a design good we mean that, as a\nwhole, it provokes aesthetic emotion, and that a bad design is a\ncongeries of lines and colours, individually satisfactory perhaps, but\nas a whole unmoving.\n\nFor, ultimately, the spectator can determine whether a design is good\nor bad only by discovering whether or no it moves him. Having made that\ndiscovery he can go on to criticise in detail; but the beginning of all\naesthetic judgment and all criticism is emotion. It is after I have been\nleft cold that I begin to notice that defective organisation of forms\nwhich I call bad design. And here, in my judgments about particular\ndesigns, I am still on pretty sure ground: it is only when I attempt to\naccount for the moving power of certain combinations that I get into the\nworld of conjecture. Nevertheless, I believe that mine are no bad\nguesses at truth, and that on the same hypothesis we can account for the\ndifference between good and bad drawing.\n\nDesign is the organisation of forms: drawing is the shaping of the forms\nthemselves. Clearly there is a point at which the two commingle, but\nthat is a matter of no present importance. When I say that drawing is\nbad, I mean that I am not moved by the contours of the forms that make\nup the work of art. The causes of bad drawing and bad design I believe\nto be similar. A form is badly drawn when it does not correspond with a\npart of an emotional conception. The shape of every form in a work of\nart should be imposed on the artist by his inspiration. The hand of the\nartist, I believe, must be guided by the necessity of expressing\nsomething he has felt not only intensely but definitely. The artist must\nknow what he is about, and what he is about must be, if I am right, the\ntranslation into material form of something that he felt in a spasm of\necstasy. Therefore, shapes that merely fill gaps will be ill-drawn.\nForms that are not dictated by any emotional necessity, forms that state\nfacts, forms that are the consequences of a theory of draughtsmanship,\nimitations of natural objects or of the forms of other works of art,\nforms that exist merely to fill spaces--padding in fact,--all these are\nworthless. Good drawing must be inspired, it must be the natural\nmanifestation of that thrill which accompanies the passionate\napprehension of form.\n\nOne word more to close this discussion. No critic is so stupid as to\nmean by \"bad drawing,\" drawing that does not represent the model\ncorrectly. The gods of the art schools, Michelangelo, Mantegna, Raffael,\n&c. played the oddest tricks with anatomy. Everyone knows that Giotto's\nfigures are less accurately drawn than those of Sir Edward Poynter; no\none supposes that they are not drawn better. We do possess a criterion\nby which we can judge drawing, and that criterion can have nothing to do\nwith truth to nature. We judge drawing by concentrating our aesthetic\nsensibility on a particular part of design. What we mean when we speak\nof \"good drawing\" and \"bad drawing\" is not doubtful; we mean\n\"aesthetically moving\" and \"aesthetically insignificant.\" Why some\ndrawing moves and some does not is a very different question. I have put\nforward an hypothesis of which I could write a pretty sharp criticism:\nthat task, however, I leave to more willing hands. Only this I will say:\njust as a competent musician knows with certainty when an instrument is\nout of tune though the criterion resides nowhere but in his own\nsensibility; so a fine critic of visual art can detect lines and colours\nthat are not alive. Whether he be looking at an embroidered pattern or\nat a careful anatomical study, the task is always the same, because the\ncriterion is always the same. What he has to decide is whether the\ndrawing is, or is not, aesthetically significant.\n\nInsistence on design is perhaps the most obvious characteristic of the\nmovement. To all are familiar those circumambient black lines that are\nintended to give definition to forms and to reveal the construction of\nthe picture. For almost all the younger artists,--Bonnard is an obvious\nexception--affect that architectural method of design which indeed has\ngenerally been preferred by European artists. The difference between\n\"architectural design\" and what I call \"imposed design\" will be obvious\nto anyone who compares a picture by Cezanne with a picture by Whistler.\nBetter still, compare any first-rate Florentine of the fourteenth or\nfifteenth century with any Sung picture. Here are two methods of\nachieving the same end, equally good, so far as I can judge, and as\ndifferent as possible. We feel towards a picture by Cezanne or Masaccio\nor Giotto as we feel towards a Romanesque church; the design seems to\nspring upwards, mass piles itself on mass, forms balance each other\nmasonrywise: there is a sense of strain, and of strength to meet it.\nTurn to a Chinese picture; the forms seem to be pinned to the silk or to\nbe hung from above. There is no sense of thrust or strain; rather there\nis the feeling of some creeper, with roots we know not where, that\nhangs itself in exquisite festoons along the wall. Though architectural\ndesign is a permanent characteristic of Western art, of four periods I\nthink it would be fairly accurate to say that it is a characteristic so\ndominant as to be distinctive; and they are Byzantine VIth Century,\nByzantine IX-XIIIth Century, Florentine XIVth and XVth Century, and the\nContemporary Movement.\n\nTo say that the artists of the movement insist on design is not to deny\nthat some of them are exceptionally fine colourists. Cezanne is one of\nthe greatest colourists that ever lived; Henri-Matisse is a great\ncolourist. Yet all, or nearly all, use colour as a mode of form. They\ndesign in colour, that is in coloured shapes. Very few fall into the\nerror of regarding colour as an end in itself, and of trying to think of\nit as something different from form. Colour in itself has little or no\nsignificance. The mere juxtaposition of tones moves us hardly at all. As\ncolourists themselves are fond of saying, \"It is the quantities that\ncount.\" It is not by his mixing and choosing, but by the shapes of his\ncolours, and the combinations of those shapes, that we recognise the\ncolourist. Colour becomes significant only when it becomes form. It is\na virtue in contemporary artists that they have set their faces against\nthe practice of juxtaposing pretty patches of colour without much\nconsidering their formal relations, and that they attempt so to organise\ntones as to raise form to its highest significance. But it is not\nsurprising that a generation of exceptionally sweet and attractive but\nrather formless colourists should be shocked by the obtrusion of those\nblack lines that seem to do violence to their darling. They are\nirritated by pictures in which there is to be no accidental charm of\nsoft lapses and lucky chiaroscuro. They do not admire the austere\ndetermination of these young men to make their work independent and\nself-supporting and unbeholden to adventitious dainties. They cannot\nunderstand this passion for works that are admirable as wholes, this\nfierce insistence on design, this willingness to leave bare the\nconstruction if by so doing the spectator may be helped to a conception\nof the plan. Critics of the Impressionist age are vexed by the naked\nbones and muscles of Post-Impressionist pictures. But, for my own part,\neven though these young artists insisted on a bareness and baldness\nexceeding anything we have yet seen, I should be far from blaming a\nband of ascetics who in an age of unorganised prettiness insisted on the\nparamount importance of design.\n\n\n\n\nIII\n\nTHE PATHETIC FALLACY\n\n\nMany of those who are enthusiastic about the movement, were they asked\nwhat they considered its most important characteristic, would reply, I\nimagine, \"The expression of a new and peculiar point of view.\"\n\"Post-Impressionism,\" I have heard people say, \"is an expression of the\nideas and feelings of that spiritual renaissance which is now growing\ninto a lusty revolution.\" With this I cannot, of course, agree. If art\nexpresses anything, it expresses some profound and general emotion\ncommon, or at least possible, to all ages, and peculiar to none. But if\nthese sympathetic people mean, as I believe they do, that the art of the\nnew movement is a manifestation of something different from--they will\nsay larger than--itself, of a spiritual revolution in fact, I will not\noppose them. Art is as good an index to the spiritual state of this age\nas of another; and in the effort of artists to free painting from the\nclinging conventions of the near past, and to use it as a means only to\nthe most sublime emotions, we may read signs of an age possessed of a\nnew sense of values and eager to turn that possession to account. It is\nimpossible to visit a good modern exhibition without feeling that we are\nback in a world not altogether unworthy to be compared with that which\nproduced primitive art. Here are men who take art seriously. Perhaps\nthey take life seriously too, but if so, that is only because there are\nthings in life (aesthetic ecstasy, for instance) worth taking seriously.\nIn life, they can distinguish between the wood and the few fine trees.\nAs for art, they know that it is something more important than a\ncriticism of life; they will not pretend that it is a traffic in\namenities; they know that it is a spiritual necessity. They are not\nmaking handsome furniture, nor pretty knick-knacks, nor tasteful\nsouvenirs; they are creating forms that stir our most wonderful\nemotions.\n\nIt is tempting to suppose that art such as this implies an attitude\ntowards society. It seems to imply a belief that the future will not be\na mere repetition of the past, but that by dint of willing and acting\nmen will conquer for themselves a life in which the claims of spirit and\nemotion will make some headway against the necessities of physical\nexistence. It seems, I say: but it would be exceedingly rash to assume\nanything of the sort, and, for myself, I doubt whether the good artist\nbothers much more about the future than about the past. Why should\nartists bother about the fate of humanity? If art does not justify\nitself, aesthetic rapture does. Whether that rapture is to be felt by\nfuture generations of virtuous and contented artisans is a matter of\npurely speculative interest. Rapture suffices. The artist has no more\ncall to look forward than the lover in the arms of his mistress. There\nare moments in life that are ends to which the whole history of humanity\nwould not be an extravagant means; of such are the moments of aesthetic\necstasy. It is as vain to imagine that the artist works with one eye on\nThe Great State of the future, as to go to his art for an expression of\npolitical or social opinions. It is not their attitude towards the State\nor towards life, but the pure and serious attitude of these artists\ntowards their art, that makes the movement significant of the age. Here\nare men who refuse all compromise, who will hire no half-way house\nbetween what they believe and what the public likes; men who decline\nflatly, and over-stridently sometimes, to concern themselves at all with\nwhat seems to them unimportant. To call the art of the movement\ndemocratic--some people have done so--is silly. All artists are\naristocrats in a sense, since no artist believes honestly in human\nequality; in any other sense to call an artist an aristocrat or a\ndemocrat is to call him something irrelevant or insulting. The man who\ncreates art especially to move the poor or especially to please the rich\nprostitutes whatever of worth may be in him. A good many artists have\nmaimed or ruined themselves by pretending that, besides the distinction\nbetween good art and bad, there is a distinction between aristocratic\nart and plebeian. In a sense all art is anarchical; to take art\nseriously is to be unable to take seriously the conventions and\nprinciples by which societies exist. It may be said with some justice\nthat Post-Impressionism is peculiarly anarchical because it insists so\nemphatically on fundamentals and challenges so violently the\nconventional tradition of art and, by implication, I suppose, the\nconventional view of life. By setting art so high, it sets industrial\ncivilisation very low. Here, then, it may shake hands with the broader\nand vaguer spirit of the age; the effort to produce serious art may bear\nwitness to a stir in the underworld, to a weariness of smug materialism\nand a more passionate and spiritual conception of life. The art of the\nmovement, in so far as it is art, expresses nothing temporal or local;\nbut it may be a manifestation of something that is happening here and\nnow, something of which the majority of mankind seems hardly yet to be\naware.\n\nMen and women who have been thrilled by the pure aesthetic significance\nof a work of art go away into the outer world in a state of excitement\nand exaltation which makes them more sensitive to all that is going\nforward about them. Thus, they realise with a heightened intensity the\nsignificance and possibility of life. It is not surprising that they\nshould read this new sense of life into that which gave it. Not in the\nleast; and I shall not quarrel with them for doing so. It is far more\nimportant to be moved by art than to know precisely what it is that\nmoves. I should just like to remind them, though, that if art were no\nmore than they sometimes fancy it to be, art would not move them as it\ndoes. If art were a mere matter of suggesting the emotions of life a\nwork of art would give to each no more than what each brought with him.\nIt is because art adds something new to our emotional experience,\nsomething that comes not from human life but from pure form, that it\nstirs us so deeply and so mysteriously. But that, for many, art not only\nadds something new, but seems to transmute and enrich the old, is\ncertain and by no means deplorable.\n\nThe fact is, this passionate and austere art of the Contemporary\nMovement is not only an index to the general ferment, it is also the\ninspiration, and even the standard, of a young, violent, and fierce\ngeneration. It is the most visible and the most successful manifestation\nof their will, or they think it is. Political reform, social reform,\nliterature even, move slowly, ankle-deep in the mud of materialism and\ndeliquescent tradition. Though not without reason Socialists claim that\nLiberals ride their horses, the jockeys still wear blue and buff. Mr.\nLloyd George stands unsteadily on the shoulders of Mr. Gladstone; the\nbulk of his colleagues cling on behind. If literature is to be made the\ntest, we shall soon be wishing ourselves back in the nineteenth\ncentury. Unless it be Thomas Hardy, there is no first-rate novelist in\nEurope; there is no first-rate poet; without disrespect to D'Annunzio,\nShaw, or Claudel, it may be said that Ibsen was their better. Since\nMozart, music has just kept her nose above the slough of realism,\nromance, and melodrama. Music seems to be where painting was in the time\nof Courbet; she is drifting through complex intellectualism and a\nbrilliant, exasperating realism, to arrive, I hope, at greater\npurity.[26] Contemporary painting is the one manifest triumph of the\nyoung age. Not even the oldest and wisest dare try to smile it away.\nThose who cannot love Cezanne and Matisse hate them; and they not only\nsay it, they shriek it. It is not surprising, then, that visual art,\nwhich seems to many the mirror in which they see realised their own\nideals, should have become for some a new religion. Not content with its\naesthetic significance, these seek in art an inspiration for the whole\nof life. For some of us, to be sure, the aesthetic significance is a\nsufficient inspiration; for the others I have no hard words. To art\nthey take their most profound and subtle emotions, their most\nmagnanimous ideas, their dearest hopes; from art they bring away\nenriched and purified emotion and exaltation, and fresh sources of both.\nIn art they imagine that they find an expression of their most intimate\nand mysterious feelings; and, though they miss, not utterly but to some\nextent, the best that art has to give, if of art they make a religion I\ndo not blame them.\n\nIn the days of Alexander Severus there lived at Rome a Greek freed man.\nAs he was a clever craftsman his lot was not hard. His body was secure,\nhis belly full, his hands and brain pleasantly busy. He lived amongst\nintelligent people and handsome objects, permitting himself such\nreasonable emotions as were recommended by his master, Epicurus. He\nawoke each morning to a quiet day of ordered satisfaction, the\nprescribed toll of unexacting labour, a little sensual pleasure, a\nlittle rational conversation, a cool argument, a judicious appreciation\nof all that the intellect can apprehend. Into this existence burst\nsuddenly a cranky fanatic, with a religion. To the Greek it seemed that\nthe breath of life had blown through the grave, imperial streets. Yet\nnothing in Rome was changed, save one immortal, or mortal, soul. The\nsame waking eyes opened on the same objects; yet all was changed; all\nwas charged with meaning. New things existed. Everything mattered. In\nthe vast equality of religious emotion the Greek forgot his status and\nhis nationality. His life became a miracle and an ecstasy. As a lover\nawakes, he awoke to a day full of consequence and delight. He had learnt\nto feel; and, because to feel a man must live, it was good to be alive.\nI know an erudite and intelligent man, a man whose arid life had been\nlittle better than one long cold in the head, for whom that madman, Van\nGogh, did nothing less.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 23: Need I say that this list is not intended to be\nexhaustive? It is merely representative.]\n\n[Footnote 24: Let us hope that it will. There certainly are ominous\nsigns of academization amongst the minor men of the movement. There is\nthe beginning of a tendency to regard certain simplifications and\ndistortions as ends in themselves and party badges. There is some danger\nof an attempt to impose a formula on the artist's individuality. At\npresent the infection has not spread far, and the disease has taken a\nmild form.]\n\n[Footnote 25: Of course there are some good artists alive who owe\nnothing to Cezanne. Fortunately two of Cezanne's contemporaries, Degas\nand Renoir, are still at work. Also there are a few who belong to the\nolder movement, _e.g._ Mr. Walter Sickert, M. Simon Bussy, M. Vuillard,\nMr. J.W. Morrice. I should be as unwilling to omit these names from a\nhistory of twentieth century art as to include them in a chapter devoted\nto the contemporary movement.]\n\n[Footnote 26: June 1913. _Ariadne in Naxos._ Is Strauss, our one\nmusician of genius, himself the pivot on which the wheel is beginning to\nswing? Having drained the cup of Wagnerism and turned it upside down, is\nhe now going to school with Mozart?]\n\n\n\n\n            V\n\n        THE FUTURE\n\n\n     I. SOCIETY AND ART\n\n    II. ART AND SOCIETY\n\n\n  [Illustration: PICASSO]\n\n\n\n\nI\n\nSOCIETY AND ART\n\n\nTo bother much about anything but the present is, we all agree, beneath\nthe dignity of a healthy human animal. Yet how many of us can resist the\nmalsane pleasure of puzzling over the past and speculating about the\nfuture? Once admit that the Contemporary Movement is something a little\nout of the common, that it has the air of a beginning, and you will\ncatch yourself saying \"Beginning of what?\" instead of settling down\nquietly to enjoy the rare spectacle of a renaissance. Art, we hope,\nserious, alive, and independent is knocking at the door, and we are\nimpelled to ask \"What will come of it?\" This is the general question,\nwhich, you will find, divides itself into two sufficiently precise\nqueries--\"What will Society do with Art?\" and \"What will Art do with\nSociety?\"\n\nIt is a mistake to suppose that because Society cannot affect Art\ndirectly, it cannot affect it at all. Society can affect Art indirectly\nbecause it can affect artists directly. Clearly, if the creation of\nworks of art were made a capital offence, the quantity, if not the\nquality, of artistic output would be affected. Proposals less barbarous,\nbut far more terrible, are from time to time put forward by cultivated\nstate-projectors who would make of artists, not criminals, but\nhighly-paid officials. Though statesmanship can do no positive good to\nart, it can avoid doing a great deal of harm: its power for ill is\nconsiderable. The one good thing Society can do for the artist is to\nleave him alone. Give him liberty. The more completely the artist is\nfreed from the pressure of public taste and opinion, from the hope of\nrewards and the menace of morals, from the fear of absolute starvation\nor punishment, and from the prospect of wealth or popular consideration,\nthe better for him and the better for art, and therefore the better for\neveryone. Liberate the artist: here is something that those powerful and\nimportant people who are always assuring us that they would do anything\nfor art can do.\n\nThey might begin the work of encouragement by disestablishing and\ndisendowing art; by withdrawing doles from art schools, and confiscating\nthe moneys misused by the Royal Academy. The case of the schools is\nurgent. Art schools do nothing but harm, because they must do something.\nArt is not to be learned; at any rate it is not to be taught. All that\nthe drawing-master can teach is the craft of imitation. In schools there\nmust be a criterion of excellence and that criterion cannot be an\nartistic one; the drawing-master sets up the only criterion he is\ncapable of using--fidelity to the model. No master can make a student\ninto an artist; but all can, and most do, turn into impostors, maniacs,\ncriminals, or just cretins, the unfortunate boys and girls who had been\nmade artists by nature. It is not the master's fault and he ought not to\nbe blamed. He is there to bring all his pupils to a certain standard of\nefficiency appreciable by inspectors and by the general public, and the\nonly quality of which such can judge is verisimilitude. The only\nrespects in which one work can be seen to differ from another by an\nordinarily insensitive person (_e.g._ a Board of Education inspector)\nare choice of subject and fidelity to common vision. So, even if a\ndrawing-master could recognise artistic talent, he would not be\npermitted to encourage it. It is not that drawing-masters are wicked,\nbut that the system is vicious. Art schools must go.\n\nThe money that the State at present devotes to the discouragement of Art\nhad better, I dare say, be given to the rich. It would be tempting to\nsave it for the purchase of works of art, but perhaps that can lead to\nnothing but mischief. It is unthinkable that any Government should ever\nbuy what is best in the work of its own age; it is a question how far\npurchase by the State even of fine old pictures is a benefit to art. It\nis not a question that need be discussed; for though a State may have\namongst its employes men who can recognise a fine work of art, provided\nit be sufficiently old, a modern State will be careful to thwart and\nstultify their dangerously good taste. State-acquisition of fine ancient\nart might or might not be a means to good--I daresay it would be; but\nthe purchase of third-rate old masters and _objets d'art_ can benefit no\none except the dealers. As I shall hope to show, something might be said\nfor supporting and enriching galleries and museums, if only the public\nattitude towards, and the official conception of, these places could be\nchanged. As for contemporary art, official patronage is the surest\nmethod of encouraging in it all that is most stupid and pernicious. Our\npublic monuments, the statues and buildings that disgrace our streets,\nour postage-stamps, coins, and official portraits are mere bait to the\nworst instincts of the worst art-students and to the better a formidable\ntemptation.\n\nSome of those generous prophets who sit at home dreaming of pure\ncommunistic societies have been good enough to find a place in them for\nthe artist. Demos is to keep for his diversion a kennel of mountebanks.\nArtists will be chosen by the State and supported by the State. The\npeople will pay the piper and call the tune. In the choice of\npoliticians the method works well enough, but to art it would be fatal.\nThe creation of soft artistic jobs is the most unlikely method of\nencouraging art. Already hundreds take to it, not because they have in\nthem that which must be expressed, but because art seems to offer a\npleasant and genteel career. When the income is assured the number of\nthose who fancy art as a profession will not diminish. On the contrary,\nin the great State of the future the competition will be appalling. I\ncan imagine the squeezing and intriguing between the friends of\napplicants and their parliamentary deputies, between the deputies and\nthe Minister of Fine Arts; and I can imagine the art produced to fulfil\na popular mandate in the days when private jobbery will be the only\ncheck on public taste. Can we not all imagine the sort of man that would\nbe chosen? Have we no experience of what the people love? Comrades, dear\ndemocratic ladies and gentlemen, pursue, by all means, your schemes for\nrighting the world, dream your dreams, conceive Utopias, but leave the\nartists out. For, tell me honestly, does any one of you believe that\nduring the last three hundred years a single good artist would have been\nsupported by your system? And remember, unless it had supported him it\nwould not have allowed him to exist. Remember, too, that you will have\nto select or reject your artists while yet they are students--you will\nnot be able to wait until a name has been imposed on you by years of\nreputation with a few good judges. If Degas is now reverenced as a\nmaster that is because his pictures fetch long prices, and his pictures\nfetch long prices because a handful of people who would soon have been\nput under the great civic pump have been for years proclaiming his\nmastery. And during those long years how has Degas lived? On the bounty\nof the people who love all things beautiful, or on the intelligence and\ndiscrimination of a few rich or richish patrons? In the great State you\nwill not be able to take your masters ready-made with years of\nreputation behind them; you will have to pick them yourselves, and pick\nthem young.\n\nHere you are, then, at the door of your annual exhibition of students'\nwork; you are come to choose two State pensioners, and pack the rest off\nto clean the drains of Melbourne. They will be chosen by popular\nvote--the only fair way of inducting a public entertainer to a snug\nbillet. But, unknown to you, I have placed amongst the exhibits two\ndrawings by Claude and one by Ingres; and at this exhibition there are\nno names on the catalogue. Do you think my men will get a single vote?\nPossibly; but dare one of you suggest that in competition with any\nrubbishy sensation-monger either of them will stand a chance? \"Oh, but,\"\nyou say, \"in the great new State everyone will be well educated.\" \"Let\nthem,\" I reply, \"be as well educated as the M.A.s of Oxford and\nCambridge who have been educated from six to six-and-twenty: and I\nsuggest that to do even that will come pretty dear. Well, then, submit\nyour anonymous collection of pictures to people qualified to elect\nmembers of parliament for our two ancient universities, and you know\nperfectly well that you will get no better result. So, don't be silly:\neven private patronage is less fatal to art than public. Whatever else\nyou may get, you will never get an artist by popular election.\"\n\nYou say that the State will select through two or three highly sensitive\nofficials. In the first place you have got to catch your officials. And\nremember, these, too, in the eyes of their fellow-workers, will be men\nwho have got hold of a soft thing. The considerations that govern the\nselection of State-paid artists will control the election of State-paid\nexperts. By what sign shall the public recognise the man of sensibility,\nalways supposing that it is a man of sensibility the public wants? John\nJones, the broker's man, thinks himself quite as good a judge of art as\nMr. Fry, and apparently Mr. Asquith thinks the trustees of the National\nGallery better than either. Suppose you have by some miracle laid hands\non a man of aesthetic sensibility and made him your officer, he will\nstill have to answer for his purchases to a popularly elected\nparliament. Things are bad enough at present: the people will not\ntolerate a public monument that is a work of art, neither do their\nobedient servants wish to impose such a thing on them; but when no one\ncan live as an artist without becoming a public servant, when all works\nof art are public monuments, do you seriously expect to have any art at\nall? When the appointment of artists becomes a piece of party patronage\ndoes anyone doubt that a score of qualifications will stand an applicant\nin better stead than that of being an artist? Imagine Mr. Lloyd George\nnominating Mr. Roger Fry Government selector of State-paid artists.\nImagine--and here I am making no heavy demand on your powers--imagine\nMr. Fry appointing some obscure and shocking student of unconventional\ntalent. Imagine Mr. Lloyd George going down to Limehouse to defend the\nappointment before thousands of voters, most of whom have a son, a\nbrother, a cousin, a friend, or a little dog who, they feel sure, is\nmuch better equipped for the job.\n\nIf the great communistic society is bent on producing art--and the\nsociety that does not produce live art is damned--there is one thing,\nand one only, that it can do. Guarantee to every citizen, whether he\nworks or whether he loafs, a bare minimum of existence--say sixpence a\nday and a bed in the common dosshouse. Let the artist be a beggar living\non public charity. Give to the industrious practical workers the sort of\nthings they like, big salaries, short hours, social consideration,\nexpensive pleasures. Let the artist have just enough to eat, and the\ntools of his trade: ask nothing of him. Materially make the life of the\nartist sufficiently miserable to be unattractive, and no one will take\nto art save those in whom the divine daemon is absolute. For all let\nthere be a choice between a life of dignified, highly-paid, and not\nover-exacting employment and the despicable life of a vagrant. There can\nbe little doubt about the choice of most, and none about that of a real\nartist. Art and Religion are very much alike, and in the East, where\nthey understand these things, there has always been a notion that\nreligion should be an amateur affair. The pungis of India are beggars.\nLet artists all over the world be beggars too. Art and Religion are not\nprofessions: they are not occupations for which men can be paid. The\nartist and the saint do what they have to do, not to make a living, but\nin obedience to some mysterious necessity. They do not produce to\nlive--they live to produce. There is no place for them in a social\nsystem based on the theory that what men desire is prolonged and\npleasant existence. You cannot fit them into the machine, you must make\nthem extraneous to it. You must make pariahs of them, since they are not\na part of society but the salt of the earth.\n\nIn saying that the mass of mankind will never be capable of making\ndelicate aesthetic judgments, I have said no more than the obvious\ntruth. A sure sensibility in visual art is at least as rare as a good\near for music. No one imagines that all are equally capable of judging\nmusic, or that a perfect ear can be acquired by study: only fools\nimagine that the power of nice discrimination in other arts is not a\npeculiar gift. Nevertheless there is no reason why the vast majority\nshould not become very much more sensitive to art than it is; the ear\ncan be trained to a point. But for the better appreciation, as for the\nfreer creation, of art more liberty is needed. Ninety-nine out of every\nhundred people who visit picture galleries need to be delivered from\nthat \"museum atmosphere\" which envelops works of art and asphyxiates\nbeholders. They, the ninety-nine, should be encouraged to approach works\nof art courageously and to judge them on their merits. Often they are\nmore sensitive to form and colour than they suppose. I have seen people\nshow a nice taste in cottons and calicoes, and things not recognised as\n\"Art\" by the custodians of museums, who would not hesitate to assert of\nany picture by Andrea del Sarto that it must be more beautiful than any\npicture by a child or a savage. In dealing with objects that are not\nexpected to imitate natural forms or to resemble standard masterpieces\nthey give free rein to their native sensibility. It is only in the\npresence of a catalogue that complete inhibition sets in. Traditional\nreverence is what lies heaviest on spectators and creators, and museums\nare too apt to become conventicles of tradition.\n\nSociety can do something for itself and for art by blowing out of the\nmuseums and galleries the dust of erudition and the stale incense of\nhero-worship. Let us try to remember that art is not something to be\ncome at by dint of study; let us try to think of it as something to be\nenjoyed as one enjoys being in love. The first thing to be done is to\nfree the aesthetic emotions from the tyranny of erudition. I was sitting\nonce behind the driver of an old horse-omnibus when a string of\nsandwich-men crossed us carrying \"The Empire\" poster. The name of Genee\nwas on the bill. \"Some call that art,\" said the driver, turning to me,\n\"but we know better\" (my longish hair, I surmise, discovered a fellow\nconnoisseur): \"if you want art you must go for it to the museums.\" How\nthis pernicious nonsense is to be knocked out of people's heads I cannot\nguess. It has been knocked in so solemnly and for so long by the\nschoolmasters and the newspapers, by cheap text-books and profound\nhistorians, by district visitors and cabinet ministers, by clergymen and\nsecularists, by labour leaders, teetotallers, anti-gamblers, and public\nbenefactors of every sort, that I am sure it will need a brighter and\nbraver word than mine to knock it out again. But out it has to be\nknocked before we can have any general sensibility to art; for, while it\nremains, to ninety-nine out of every hundred a work of art will be dead\nthe moment it enters a public gallery.\n\nThe museums and galleries terrify us. We are crushed by the tacit\nadmonition frowned from every corner that these treasures are displayed\nfor study and improvement, by no means to provoke emotion. Think of\nItaly--every town with its public collection; think of the religious\nsightseers! How are we to persuade these middle-class masses, so patient\nand so pathetic in their quest, that really they could get some pleasure\nfrom the pictures if only they did not know, and did not care to know,\nwho painted them. They cannot all be insensitive to form and colour; and\nif only they were not in a flutter to know, or not to forget, who\npainted the pictures, when they were painted, and what they represent,\nthey might find in them the key that unlocks a world in the existence of\nwhich they are, at present, unable to believe. And the millions who stay\nat home, how are they to be persuaded that the thrill provoked by a\nlocomotive or a gasometer is the real thing?--when will they understand\nthat the iron buildings put up by Mr. Humphrey are far more likely to be\nworks of art than anything they will see at the summer exhibition of\nthe Royal Academy?[27] Can we persuade the travelling classes that an\nordinarily sensitive human being has a better chance of appreciating an\nItalian primitive than an expert hagiographer? Will they understand\nthat, as a rule, the last to feel aesthetic emotion is the historian of\nart? Can we induce the multitude to seek in art, not edification, but\nexaltation? Can we make them unashamed of the emotion they feel for the\nfine lines of a warehouse or a railway bridge? If we can do this we\nshall have freed works of art from the museum atmosphere; and this is\njust what we have got to do. We must make people understand that forms\ncan be significant without resembling Gothic cathedrals or Greek\ntemples, and that art is the creation, not the imitation, of form. Then,\nbut not till then, can they go with impunity to seek aesthetic emotion\nin museums and galleries.\n\nIt is argued with plausibility that a sensitive people would have no use\nfor museums. It is said that to go in search of aesthetic emotion is\nwrong, that art should be a part of life--something like the evening\npapers or the shop windows that people enjoy as they go about their\nbusiness. But, if the state of mind of one who enters a gallery in\nsearch of aesthetic emotion is necessarily unsatisfactory, so is the\nstate of one who sits down to read poetry. The lover of poetry shuts the\ndoor of his chamber and takes down a volume of Milton with the\ndeliberate intention of getting himself out of one world and into\nanother. The poetry of Milton is not a part of daily life, though for\nsome it makes daily life supportable. The value of the greatest art\nconsists not in its power of becoming a part of common existence but in\nits power of taking us out of it. I think it was William Morris who said\nthat poetry should be something that a man could invent and sing to his\nfellows as he worked at the loom. Too much of what Morris wrote may well\nhave been so invented. But to create and to appreciate the greatest art\nthe most absolute abstraction from the affairs of life is essential. And\nas, throughout the ages, men and women have gone to temples and churches\nin search of an ecstasy incompatible with and remote from the\npreoccupations and activities of laborious humanity, so they may go to\nthe temples of art to experience, a little out of this world, emotions\nthat are of another. It is not as sanctuaries from life--sanctuaries\ndevoted to the cult of aesthetic emotion--but as class-rooms,\nlaboratories, homes of research and warehouses of tradition, that\nmuseums and galleries become noxious.\n\nHuman sensibility must be freed from the dust of erudition and the\nweight of tradition; it must also be freed from the oppression of\nculture. For, of all the enemies of art, culture is perhaps the most\ndangerous, because the least obvious. By \"culture\" it is, of course,\npossible to mean something altogether blameless. It may mean an\neducation that aims at nothing but sharpening sensibility and\nstrengthening the power of self-expression. But culture of that sort is\nnot for sale: to some it comes from solitary contemplation, to others\nfrom contact with life; in either case it comes only to those who are\ncapable of using it. Common culture, on the other hand, is bought and\nsold in open market. Cultivated society, in the ordinary sense of the\nword, is a congeries of persons who have been educated to appreciate\n_le beau et le bien_. A cultivated person is one on whom art has not\nimpressed itself, but on whom it has been impressed--one who has not\nbeen overwhelmed by the significance of art, but who knows that the\nnicest people have a peculiar regard for it. The characteristic of this\nSociety is that, though it takes an interest in art, it does not take\nart seriously. Art for it is not a necessity, but an amenity. Art is not\nsomething that one might meet and be overwhelmed by between the pages of\n_Bradshaw_, but something to be sought and saluted at appropriate times\nin appointed places. Culture feels no imperative craving for art such as\none feels for tobacco; rather it thinks of art as something to be taken\nin polite and pleasant doses, as one likes to take the society of one's\nless interesting acquaintances. Patronage of the Arts is to the\ncultivated classes what religious practice is to the lower-middle, the\nhomage that matter pays to spirit, or, amongst the better sort, that\nintellect pays to emotion. Neither the cultivated nor the pious are\ngenuinely sensitive to the tremendous emotions of art and religion; but\nboth know what they are expected to feel, and when they ought to feel\nit.\n\nNow if culture did nothing worse than create a class of well-educated\nladies and gentlemen who read books, attend concerts, travel in Italy,\nand talk a good deal about art without ever guessing what manner of\nthing it is, culture would be nothing to make a fuss about.\nUnfortunately, culture is an active disease which causes positive ill\nand baulks potential good. In the first place, cultivated people always\nwish to cultivate others. Cultivated parents cultivate their children;\nthousands of wretched little creatures are daily being taught to love\nthe beautiful. If they happen to have been born insensitive this is of\nno great consequence, but it is misery to think of those who have had\nreal sensibilities ruined by conscientious parents: it is so hard to\nfeel a genuine personal emotion for what one has been brought up to\nadmire. Yet if children are to grow up into acceptable members of the\ncultivated class they must be taught to hold the right opinions--they\nmust recognise the standards. Standards of taste are the essence of\nculture. That is why the cultured have ever been defenders of the\nantique. There grows up in the art of the past a traditional\nclassification under standard masterpieces by means of which even those\nwho have no native sensibility can discriminate between works of art.\nThat is just what culture wants; so it insists on the veneration of\nstandards and frowns on anything that cannot be justified by reference\nto them. That is the serious charge against culture. A person familiar\nwith the masterpieces of Europe, but insensitive to that which makes\nthem masterpieces, will be utterly non-plussed by a novel manifestation\nof the mysterious \"that.\" It is well that old masters should be\nrespected; it were better that vital art should be welcome. Vital art is\na necessity, and vital art is stifled by culture, which insists that\nartists shall respect the standards, or, to put it bluntly, shall\nimitate old masters.\n\nThe cultured, therefore, who expect in every picture at least some\nreference to a familiar masterpiece, create, unconsciously enough, a\nthoroughly unwholesome atmosphere. For they are rich and patronising and\nliberal. They are the very innocent but natural enemies of originality,\nfor an original work is the touchstone that exposes educated taste\nmasquerading as sensibility. Besides, it is reasonable that those who\nhave been at such pains to sympathise with artists should expect artists\nto think and feel as they do. Originality, however, thinks and feels for\nitself; commonly the original artist does not live the refined,\nintellectual life that would befit the fancy-man of the cultured\nclasses. He is not picturesque; perhaps he is positively inartistic; he\nis neither a gentleman nor a blackguard; culture is angry and\nincredulous. Here is one who spends his working hours creating something\nthat seems strange and disquieting and ugly, and devotes his leisure to\nsimple animalities; surely one so utterly unlike ourselves cannot be an\nartist? So culture attacks and sometimes ruins him. If he survives,\nculture has to adopt him. He becomes part of the tradition, a standard,\na stick with which to beat the next original genius who dares to shove\nan unsponsored nose above water.\n\nIn the nineteenth century cultured people were amazed to find that such\ncads as Keats and Burns were also great poets. They had to be accepted,\nand their caddishness had to be explained away. The shocking\nintemperance of Burns was deplored in a paragraph, and passed over--as\nthough Burns were not as essentially a drunkard as a poet! The\nvulgarity of Keats's letters to Fanny Brawne did not escape the nice\ncensure of Matthew Arnold who could not be expected to see that a man\nincapable of writing such letters would not have written \"The Eve of St.\nAgnes.\" In our day culture having failed to suppress Mr. Augustus John\nwelcomes him with undiscriminating enthusiasm some ten years behind the\ntimes. Here and there, a man of power may force the door, but culture\nnever loves originality until it has lost the appearance of originality.\nThe original genius is ill to live with until he is dead. Culture will\nnot live with him; it takes as lover the artificer of the _faux-bon_. It\nadores the man who is clever enough to imitate, not any particular work\nof art, but art itself. It adores the man who gives in an unexpected way\njust what it has been taught to expect. It wants, not art, but something\nso much like art that it can feel the sort of emotions it would be nice\nto feel for art. To be frank, cultivated people are no fonder of art\nthan the Philistines; but they like to get thrills, and they like to see\nold faces under new bonnets. They admire Mr. Lavery's seductive\nbanalities and the literary and erudite novelettes of M. Rostand. They\ngo silly over Reinhardt and Bakst. These confectioners seem to give the\ndistinction of art to the natural thoughts and feelings of cultivated\npeople. Culture is far more dangerous than Philistinism because it is\nmore intelligent and more pliant. It has a specious air of being on the\nside of the artist. It has the charm of its acquired taste, and it can\ncorrupt because it can speak with an authority unknown in Philistia.\nBecause it pretends to care about art, artists are not indifferent to\nits judgments. Culture imposes on people who would snap their fingers at\nvulgarity. With culture itself, even in the low sense in which I have\nbeen using the word, we need not pick a quarrel, but we must try to free\nthe artist and the public too from the influence of cultivated opinion.\nThe liberation will not be complete until those who have already learned\nto despise the opinion of the lower middle-classes learn also to neglect\nthe standards and the disapproval of people who are forced by their\nemotional limitations to regard art as an elegant amenity.\n\nIf you would have fine art and fine appreciation of art, you must have a\nfine free life for your artists and for yourselves. That is another\nthing that Society can do for art: it can kill the middle-class ideal.\nWas ever ideal so vulnerable? The industrious apprentice who by slow\npettifogging hardness works his way to the dignity of material\nprosperity, Dick Whittington, what a hero for a high-spirited nation!\nWhat dreams our old men dream, what visions float into the minds of our\nseers! Eight hours of intelligent production, eight hours of thoughtful\nrecreation, eight hours of refreshing sleep for all! What a vision to\ndangle before the eyes of a hungry people! If it is great art and fine\nlife that you want, you must renounce this religion of safe mediocrity.\nComfort is the enemy; luxury is merely the bugbear of the bourgeoisie.\nNo soul was ever ruined by extravagance or even by debauch; it is the\nsteady, punctual gnawing of comfort that destroys. That is the triumph\nof matter over mind; that is the last tyranny. For how are they better\nthan slaves who must stop their work because it is time for luncheon,\nmust break up a conversation to dress for dinner, must leave on the\ndoorstep the friend they have not seen for years so as not to miss the\ncustomary train?\n\nSociety can do something for art, because it can increase liberty, and\nin a liberal atmosphere art thrives. Even politicians can do something.\nThey can repeal censorious laws and abolish restrictions on freedom of\nthought and speech and conduct. They can protect minorities. They can\ndefend originality from the hatred of the mediocre mob. They can make an\nend of the doctrine that the State has a right to crush unpopular\nopinions in the interests of public order. A mighty liberty to be\nallowed to speak acceptable words to the rabble! The least that the\nState can do is to protect people who have something to say that may\ncause a riot. What will not cause a riot is probably not worth saying.\nAt present, to agitate for an increase of liberty is the best that any\nordinary person can do for the advancement of art.\n\n\n\n\nII\n\nART AND SOCIETY\n\n\nWhat might Art do for Society? Leaven it; perhaps even redeem it: for\nSociety needs redemption. Towards the end of the nineteenth century life\nseemed to be losing its savour. The world had grown grey and anaemic,\nlacking passion, it seemed. Sedateness became fashionable; only dull\npeople cared to be thought spiritual. At its best the late nineteenth\ncentury reminds one of a sentimental farce, at its worst of a heartless\njoke. But, as we have seen, before the turn, first in France, then\nthroughout Europe, a new emotional movement began to manifest itself.\nThis movement if it was not to be lost required a channel along which it\nmight flow to some purpose. In the Middle Ages such a channel would have\nbeen ready to hand; spiritual ferment used to express itself through the\nChristian Church, generally in the teeth of official opposition. A\nmodern movement of any depth cannot so express itself. Whatever the\nreasons may be, the fact is certain. The principal reason, I believe, is\nthat the minds of modern men and women can find no satisfaction in\ndogmatic religion; and Christianity, by a deplorable mischance, has been\nunwilling to relinquish dogmas that are utterly irrelevant to its\nessence. It is the entanglement of religion in dogma that still keeps\nthe world superficially irreligious. Now, though no religion can escape\nthe binding weeds of dogma, there is one that throws them off more\neasily and light-heartedly than any other. That religion is art; for art\nis a religion. It is an expression of and a means to states of mind as\nholy as any that men are capable of experiencing; and it is towards art\nthat modern minds turn, not only for the most perfect expression of\ntranscendent emotion, but for an inspiration by which to live.\n\nFrom the beginning art has existed as a religion concurrent with all\nother religions. Obviously there can be no essential antagonism between\nit and them. Genuine art and genuine religion are different\nmanifestations of one spirit, so are sham art and sham religion. For\nthousands of years men have expressed in art their ultra-human emotions,\nand have found in it that food by which the spirit lives. Art is the\nmost universal and the most permanent of all forms of religious\nexpression, because the significance of formal combinations can be\nappreciated as well by one race and one age as by another, and because\nthat significance is as independent as mathematical truth of human\nvicissitudes. On the whole, no other vehicle of emotion and no other\nmeans to ecstasy has served man so well. In art any flood of spiritual\nexaltation finds a channel ready to nurse and lead it: and when art\nfails it is for lack of emotion, not for lack of formal adaptability.\nThere never was a religion so adaptable and catholic as art. And now\nthat the young movement begins to cast about for a home in which to\npreserve itself and live, what more natural than that it should turn to\nthe one religion of unlimited forms and frequent revolutions?\n\nFor art is the one religion that is always shaping its form to fit the\nspirit, the one religion that will never for long be fettered in dogmas.\nIt is a religion without a priesthood; and it is well that the new\nspirit should not be committed to the hands of priests. The new spirit\nis in the hands of the artists; that is well. Artists, as a rule, are\nthe last to organise themselves into official castes, and such castes,\nwhen organised, rarely impose on the choicer spirits. Rebellious\npainters are a good deal commoner than rebellious clergymen. On\ncompromise which is the bane of all religion--since men cannot serve two\nmasters--almost all the sects of Europe live and grow fat. Artists have\nbeen more willing to go lean. By compromise the priests have succeeded\nmarvellously in keeping their vessel intact. The fine contempt for the\nvessel manifested by the original artists of each new movement is almost\nas salutary as their sublime belief in the spirit. To us, looking at the\nhistory of art, the periods of abjection and compromise may appear\nunconscionably long, but by comparison with those of other religions\nthey are surprisingly short. Sooner or later a true artist arises, and\noften by his unaided strength succeeds in so reshaping the vessel that\nit shall contain perfectly the spirit.\n\nReligion which is an affair of emotional conviction should have nothing\nto do with intellectual beliefs. We have an emotional conviction that\nsome things are better than others, that some states of mind are good\nand that others are not; we have a strong emotional conviction that a\ngood world ought to be preferred to a bad; but there is no proving these\nthings. Few things of importance can be proved; important things have to\nbe felt and expressed. That is why people with things of importance to\nsay tend to write poems rather than moral treatises. I make my critics a\npresent of that stick. The original sin of dogmatists is that they are\nnot content to feel and express but must needs invent an intellectual\nconcept to stand target for their emotion. From the nature of their\nemotions they infer an object the existence of which they find\nthemselves obliged to prove by an elaborately disingenuous metaphysic.\nThe consequence is inevitable; religion comes to mean, not the feeling\nof an emotion, but adherence to a creed. Instead of being a matter of\nemotional conviction it becomes a matter of intellectual propositions.\nAnd here, very properly, the sceptic steps in and riddles the _ad hoc_\nmetaphysic of the dogmatist with unanswerable objections. No Cambridge\nRationalist can presume to deny that I feel a certain emotion, but the\nmoment I attempt to prove the existence of its object I lay myself open\nto a bad four hours.\n\nNo one, however, wishes to deny the existence of the immediate object\nof aesthetic emotion--combinations of lines and colours. For my\nsuggestion that there may be a remote object I shall probably get into\ntrouble. But if my metaphysical notions are demolished in a paragraph,\nthat will not matter in the least. No metaphysical notions about art\nmatter. All that matter are the aesthetic emotion and its immediate\nobject. As to the existence of a remote object and its possible nature\nthere have been innumerable theories, most, if not all, of which have\nbeen discredited. Though a few have been defended fiercely, they have\nnever been allowed to squeeze out art completely: dogma has never\nsucceeded in ousting religion. It has been realised always to some\nextent that the significance of art depends chiefly on the emotion it\nprovokes, that works are more important than theories. Although attempts\nhave been made to impose dogmas, to define the remote object and to\ndirect the emotion, a single original artist has generally been strong\nenough to wreck the spurious orthodoxy. Dimly it has always been\nperceived that a picture which moves aesthetically cannot be wrong; and\nthat the theory that condemns it as heretical condemns itself. Art\nremains an undogmatic religion. You are invited to feel an emotion, not\nto acquiesce in a theory.\n\nArt, then, may satisfy the religious need of an age grown too acute for\ndogmatic religion, but to do so art must enlarge its sphere of\ninfluence. There must be more popular art, more of that art which is\nunimportant to the universe but important to the individual: for art can\nbe second-rate yet genuine. Also, art must become less exclusively\nprofessional. That will not be achieved by bribing the best artists to\ndebase themselves, but by enabling everyone to create such art as he\ncan. It is probable that most are capable of expressing themselves, to\nsome extent, in form; it is certain that in so doing they can find an\nextraordinary happiness. Those who have absolutely nothing to express\nand absolutely no power of expression are God's failures; they should be\nkindly treated along with the hopelessly idiotic and the hydrocephalous.\nOf the majority it is certainly true that they have some vague but\nprofound emotions, also it is certain that only in formal expression can\nthey realise them. To caper and shout is to express oneself, yet is it\ncomfortless; but introduce the idea of formality, and in dance and song\nyou may find satisfying delight. Form is the talisman. By form the\nvague, uneasy, and unearthly emotions are transmuted into something\ndefinite, logical, and above the earth. Making useful objects is dreary\nwork, but making them according to the mysterious laws of formal\nexpression is half way to happiness. If art is to do the work of\nreligion, it must somehow be brought within reach of the people who need\nreligion, and an obvious means of achieving this is to introduce into\nuseful work the thrill of creation.\n\nBut, after all, useful work must remain, for the most part, mechanical;\nand if the useful workers want to express themselves as completely as\npossible, they must do so in their leisure. There are two kinds of\nformal expression open to all--dancing and singing. Certainly it is in\ndance and song that ordinary people come nearest to the joy of creation.\nIn no age can there be more than a few first-rate artists, but in any\nthere might be millions of genuine ones; and once it is understood that\nart which is unfit for public exhibition may yet be created for private\npleasure no one will feel shame at being called an amateur. We shall not\nhave to pretend that all our friends are great artists, because they\nwill make no such pretence themselves. In the great State they will not\nbe of the company of divine beggars. They will be amateurs who\nconsciously use art as a means to emotional beatitude; they will not be\nartists who, consciously or unconsciously, use everything as a means to\nart. Let us dance and sing, then, for dancing and singing are true arts,\nuseless materially, valuable only for their aesthetic significance.\nAbove all, let us dance and devise dances--dancing is a very pure art, a\ncreation of abstract form; and if we are to find in art emotional\nsatisfaction, it is essential that we shall become creators of form. We\nmust not be content to contemplate merely; we must create; we must be\nactive in our dealings with art.\n\nIt is here that I shall fall foul of certain excellent men and women who\nare attempting to \"bring art into the lives of the people\" by dragging\nparties of school children and factory girls through the National\nGallery and the British Museum. Who is not familiar with those little\nflocks of victims clattering and shuffling through the galleries,\ninspissating the gloom of the museum atmosphere? What is being done to\ntheir native sensibilities by the earnest bear-leader with his (or her)\ncatalogue of dates and names and appropriate comments? What have all\nthese tags of mythology and history, these pedagogic raptures and\nperipatetic ecstasies, to do with genuine emotion? In the guise of what\ngrisly and incomprehensible charlatan is art being presented to the\npeople? The only possible effect of personally conducted visits must be\nto confirm the victims in their suspicion that art is something\ninfinitely remote, infinitely venerable, and infinitely dreary. They\ncome away with a respectful but permanent horror of that old sphinx who\nsits in Trafalgar Square propounding riddles that are not worth\nanswering, tended by the cultured and nourished by the rich.\n\nFirst learn to walk, then try running. An artisan of exceptional\nsensibility may get something from the masterpieces of the National\nGallery, provided there is no cultivated person at hand to tell him what\nto feel, or to prevent him feeling anything by telling him to think. An\nartisan of ordinary sensibility had far better keep away until, by\ntrying to express himself in form, he has gained some glimmer of a\nnotion of what artists are driving at. Surely there can be no reason why\nalmost every man and woman should not be a bit of an artist since\nalmost every child is. In most children a sense of form is discernible.\nWhat becomes of it? It is the old story: the child is father to the man;\nand if you wish to preserve for the man the gift with which he was born,\nyou must catch him young, or rather prevent his being caught. Can we by\nany means thwart the parents, the teachers, and the systems of education\nthat turn children into modern men and women? Can we save the artist\nthat is in almost every child? At least we can offer some practical\nadvice. Do not tamper with that direct emotional reaction to things\nwhich is the genius of children. Do not destroy their sense of reality\nby teaching them to manipulate labels. Do not imagine that adults must\nbe the best judges of what is good and what matters. Don't be such an\nass as to suppose that what excites uncle is more exciting than what\nexcites Tommy. Don't suppose that a ton of experience is worth a flash\nof insight, and don't forget that a knowledge of life can help no one to\nan understanding of art. Therefore do not educate children to be\nanything or to feel anything; put them in the way of finding out what\nthey want and what they are. So much in general. In particular I would\nsay, do not take children to galleries and museums; still less, of\ncourse, send them to art schools to be taught high-toned commercialism.\nDo not encourage them to join guilds of art and crafts, where, though\nthey may learn a craft, they will lose their sense of art. In those\nrespectable institutions reigns a high conception of sound work and\nhonest workmanship. Alas! why cannot people who set themselves to be\nsound and honest remember that there are other things in life? The\nhonest craftsmen of the guilds have an ideal which is praiseworthy and\npractical, which is mediocre and unmagnanimous, which is moral and not\nartistic. Craftsmen are men of principle, and, like all men of\nprinciple, they abandon the habit of thinking and feeling because they\nfind it easier to ask and answer the question, \"Does this square with my\nprinciples?\"--than to ask and answer the question, \"Do I feel this to be\ngood or true or beautiful?\" Therefore, I say, do not encourage a child\nto take up with the Arts and Crafts. Art is not based on craft, but on\nsensibility; it does not live by honest labour, but by inspiration. It\nis not to be taught in workshops and schoolrooms by craftsmen and\npedants, though it may be ripened in studios by masters who are artists.\nA good craftsman the boy must become if he is to be a good artist; but\nlet him teach himself the tricks of his trade by experiment, not in\ncraft, but in art.\n\nTo those who busy themselves about bringing art into the lives of the\npeople, I would also say--Do not dabble in revivals. The very word\nsmacks of the vault. Revivals look back; art is concerned with the\npresent. People will not be tempted to create by being taught to\nimitate. Except that they are charming, revivals of morris-dancing and\nfolk-singing are little better than Arts and Crafts in the open. The\ndust of the museum is upon them. They may turn boys and girls into\nnimble virtuosi; they will not make them artists. Because no two ages\nexpress their sense of form in precisely the same way all attempts to\nrecreate the forms of another age must sacrifice emotional expression to\nimitative address. Old-world merry-making can no more satisfy sharp\nspiritual hunger than careful craftsmanship or half hours with our \"Art\nTreasures.\" Passionate creation and ecstatic contemplation, these alone\nwill satisfy men in search of a religion.\n\nI believe it is possible, though extremely difficult, to give people\nboth--if they really want them. Only, I am sure that, for most, creation\nmust precede contemplation. In Monsieur Poiret's _Ecole Martine_[28]\nscores of young French girls, picked up from the gutter or thereabouts,\nare at this moment creating forms of surprising charm and originality.\nThat they find delight in their work is not disputed. They copy no\nmaster, they follow no tradition; what they owe to the past--and it is\nmuch--they have borrowed quite unconsciously with the quality of their\nbodies and their minds from the history and traditional culture of their\nrace. Their art differs from savage art as a French _midinette_ differs\nfrom a squaw, but it is as original and vital as the work of savages. It\nis not great art, it is not profoundly significant, it is often frankly\nthird-rate, but it is genuine; and therefore I rate the artisans of the\n_Ecole Martine_ with the best contemporary painters, not as artists, but\nas manifestations of the movement.\n\nI am no devout lover of rag-time and turkey-trotting, but they too are\nmanifestations. In those queer exasperated rhythms I find greater\npromise of a popular art than in revivals of folk-song and\nmorris-dancing. At least they bear some relationship to the emotions of\nthose who sing and dance them. In so far as they are significant they\nare good, but they are of no great significance. It is not in the souls\nof bunny-huggers that the new ferment is potent; they will not dance and\nsing the world out of its lethargy; not to them will the future owe that\ndebt which I trust it will be quick to forget. There is nothing very\nwonderful or very novel about rag-time or tango, but to overlook any\nlive form of expression is a mistake, and to attack it is sheer\nsilliness. Tango and rag-time are kites sped by the breeze that fills\nthe great sails of visual art. Not every man can keep a cutter, but\nevery boy can buy a kite. In an age that is seeking new forms in which\nto express that emotion which can be expressed satisfactorily in form\nalone, the wise will look hopefully at any kind of dancing or singing\nthat is at once unconventional and popular.\n\nSo, let the people try to create form for themselves. Probably they will\nmake a mess of it; that will not matter. The important thing is to have\nlive art and live sensibility; the copious production of bad art is a\nwaste of time, but, so long as it is not encouraged to the detriment of\ngood, nothing worse. Let everyone make himself an amateur, and lose the\nnotion that art is something that lives in the museums understood by the\nlearned alone. By practising an art it is possible that people will\nacquire sensibility; if they acquire the sensibility to appreciate, even\nto some extent, the greatest art they will have found the new religion\nfor which they have been looking. I do not dream of anything that would\nburden or lighten the catalogues of ecclesiastical historians. But if it\nbe true that modern men can find little comfort in dogmatic religion,\nand if it be true that this age, in reaction from the materialism of the\nnineteenth century, is becoming conscious of its spiritual need and\nlongs for satisfaction, then it seems reasonable to advise them to seek\nin art what they want and art can give. Art will not fail them; but it\nmay be that the majority must always lack the sensibility that can take\nfrom art what art offers.\n\nThat will be very sad for the majority; it will not matter much to art.\nFor those who can feel the significance of form, art can never be less\nthan a religion. In art these find what other religious natures found\nand still find, I doubt not, in impassioned prayer and worship. They\nfind that emotional confidence, that assurance of absolute good, which\nmakes of life a momentous and harmonious whole. Because the aesthetic\nemotions are outside and above life, it is possible to take refuge in\nthem from life. He who has once lost himself in an \"O Altitudo\" will not\nbe tempted to over-estimate the fussy excitements of action. He who can\nwithdraw into the world of ecstasy will know what to think of\ncircumstance. He who goes daily into the world of aesthetic emotion\nreturns to the world of human affairs equipped to face it courageously\nand even a little contemptuously. And if by comparison with aesthetic\nrapture he finds most human passion trivial, he need not on that account\nbecome unsympathetic or inhuman. For practical purposes, even, it is\npossible that the religion of art will serve a man better than the\nreligion of humanity. He may learn in another world to doubt the extreme\nimportance of this, but if that doubt dims his enthusiasm for some\nthings that are truly excellent it will dispel his illusions about many\nthat are not. What he loses in philanthropy he may gain in magnanimity;\nand because his religion does not begin with an injunction to love all\nmen, it will not end, perhaps, in persuading him to hate most of them.\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 27: An example of this was the temporary police-court set up\nrecently in Francis Street, just off the Tottenham Court Road. I do not\nknow whether it yet stands; if so, it is one of the few tolerable pieces\nof modern architecture in London.]\n\n[Footnote 28: We may hope much from the Omega Workshops in London; but\nat present they employ only trained artists. We have yet to see what\neffect they will have on the untrained.]\n\n\nTHE END\n\n\nPrinted in England at the Ballantyne Press\nSpottiswoode, Ballantyne & Co. L'td.\nColchester, London & Eton","title":"Art","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":58755}