Part 10

IV. HARMONY OF COLOUR.

We here naturally raise the question: If, owing to the small quantity of light and saturation of his colours, the artist seeks, in all kinds of indirect ways, by imitating subjective impressions to attain resemblance to nature, as close as possible, but still imperfect, would it not be more convenient to seek for means of obviating these evils? Such there are indeed. Frescoes are sometimes viewed in direct sunlight; transparencies and paintings on glass can utilise far higher degrees of brightness, and far more saturated colours; in dioramas and in theatrical decorations we may employ powerful artificial light, and, if need be, the electric light. But when I enumerate these branches of art, it will at once strike you that those works which we admire as the greatest masterpieces of painting, do not belong to this class; but by far the larger number of the great works of art are executed with the comparatively dull water or oil-colours, or at any rate for rooms with softened light. If higher artistic effects could be attained with colours lighted by the sun, we should undoubtedly have pictures which took advantage of this. Fresco painting would have led to this; or the experiments of Münich’s celebrated optician Steinheil, which he made as a matter of science, that is, to produce oil paintings which should be looked at in bright sunshine, would not be isolated.

Experiment seems therefore to teach, that moderation of light and of colours in pictures is ever advantageous, and we need only look at frescoes in direct sunlight, such as those of the new Pinakothek in Münich, to learn in what this advantage consists. Their brightness is so great that we cannot look at them steadily for any length of time. And what in this case is so painful and so tiring to the eye, would also operate in a smaller degree if, in a picture, brilliant colours were used, even locally and to a moderate extent, which were intended to represent bright sunlight, and a mass of light shed over the picture. It is much easier to produce an accurate imitation of the feeble light of moonshine with artificial light in dioramas and theatre decorations.

We may therefore designate truth to Nature of a beautiful picture as an ennobled fidelity to Nature. Such a picture reproduces all that is essential in the impression, and attains full vividness of conception, but without injury or tiring the eye by the nude lights of reality. The differences between Art and Nature are chiefly confined, as we have already seen, to those matters which we can in reality only estimate in an uncertain manner, such as the absolute intensities of light.

That which is pleasant to the senses, the beneficial but not exhausting fatigue of our nerves, the feeling of comfort, corresponds in this case, as in others, to those conditions which are most favourable for perceiving the outer world, and which admit of the finest discrimination and observation.

It has been mentioned above that the discrimination of the finest shadows, and of the modelling which they express, is the most delicate under a certain mean brightness. I should like to direct your attention to another point which has great importance in painting: I refer to our natural delight in colours, which has undoubtedly a great influence upon our pleasure in the works of the painter. In its simplest expression, as pleasure in gaudy flowers, feathers, stones, in fireworks, and Bengal lights, this inclination has but little to do with man’s sense of art; it only appears as the natural pleasure of the perceptive organism in the varying and multifarious excitation of its various nerves, which is necessary for its healthy continuance and productivity. But the thorough fitness in the construction of living organisms, whatever their origin, excludes the possibility that in the majority of healthy individuals an instinct should be developed or maintain itself which did not serve some definite purpose.

We have not far to seek for the delight in light and in colours, and for the dread of darkness; this coincides with the endeavour to see and to recognise surrounding objects. Darkness owes the greater part of the terror which it inspires to the fright of what is unknown and cannot be recognised. A coloured picture gives a far more accurate, richer, and easier conception than a similarly executed drawing, which only retains the contrasts of light and shade. A picture retains the latter, but has in addition the material for discrimination which colours afford; by which surfaces which appear equally bright in the drawing, owing to their different colour, are now assigned to various objects, or again as alike in colour are seen to be parts of the same, or of similar objects. In utilising the relations thus naturally given, the artist, by means of prominent colours, can direct and enchain the attention of the observer upon the chief objects of the picture; and by the variety of the garments he can discriminate the figures from each other, but complete each individual one in itself. Even the natural pleasure in pure, strongly saturated colours, finds its justification in this direction. The case is analogous to that in music, with the full, pure, well-sounding tones of a beautiful voice. Such a one is more expressive; that is, even the smallest change of its pitch, or its quality--any slight interruption, any tremulousness, any rising or falling in it--is at once more distinctly recognised by the hearer than could be the case with a less regular sound; and it seems also that the powerful excitation which it produces in the ear of the listener, arouses trains of ideas and passions more strongly than does a feebler excitation of the same kind. A pure, fundamental colour bears to small admixtures the same relation as a dark ground on which the slightest shade of light is visible. Any of the ladies present will have known how sensitive clothes of uniform saturated shades are to dirt, in comparison with grey or greyish-brown materials. This also corresponds to the conclusions from Young’s theory of colours. According to this theory, the perception of each of the three fundamental colours arises from the excitation of only one kind of sensitive fibres, while the two others are at rest; or at any rate are but feebly excited. A brilliant, pure colour produces a powerful stimulus, and yet, at the same time, a great degree of sensitiveness to the admixture of other colours, in those systems of nerve-fibres which are at rest. The modelling of a coloured surface mainly depends upon the reflection of light of other colours which falls upon them from without. It is more particularly when the material glistens that the reflections of the bright places are preferably of the colour of the incident light. In the depth of the folds, on the contrary, the coloured surface reflects against itself, and thereby makes its own colour more saturated. A white surface, on the contrary, of great brightness, produces a dazzling effect, and is thereby insensitive to slight degrees of shade. Strong colours thus, by the powerful irritation which they produce, can enchain the eye of the observer, and yet be expressive for the slightest change of modelling or of illumination; that is, they are expressive in the artistic sense.

If, on the other hand, we coat too large surfaces, they produce fatigue for the prominent colour, and a diminution in sensitiveness towards it. This colour then becomes more grey, and on all surfaces of a different colour the complementary tint appears, especially on grey or black surfaces. Hence therefore clothes, and more particularly curtains, which are of too bright a single colour, produce an unsatisfactory and fatiguing effect; the clothes have moreover the disadvantage for the wearer that they cover face and hands with the complementary colour. Blue produces yellow, violet gives greenish yellow, bright purple gives green, scarlet gives blue, and, conversely, yellow gives blue, etc. There is another circumstance which the artist has to consider, that colour is for him an important means of attracting the attention of the observer. To be able to do this he must be sparing in the use of the pure colours, otherwise they distract the attention, and the picture becomes glaring. It is necessary, on the other hand, to avoid a one-sided fatigue of the eye by too prominent a colour. This is effected either by introducing the prominent colour to a moderate extent upon a dull, slightly coloured ground, or by the juxtaposition of variously saturated colours, which produce a certain equilibrium of irritation in the eye, and, by the contrast in their after-images, strengthen and increase each other. A green surface on which the green after-image of a purple one falls, appears to be a far purer green than without such an after-image. By fatigue towards purple, that is towards red and violet, any admixture of these two colours in the green is enfeebled, while this itself produces its full effect. In this way the sensation of green is purified from any foreign admixture. Even the purest and most saturated green, which Nature shows in the prismatic spectrum, may thus acquire a higher degree of saturation. We find thus that the other pairs of complementary colours, which we have mentioned, make each other more brilliant by their contrast, while colours which are very similar are detrimental to each other, and acquire a grey tint.

These relations of the colours to each other have manifestly a great influence on the degree of pleasure which different combinations of colours afford. Two colours may, without injury, be juxtaposed, which indeed are so similar as to look like varieties of the same colour, produced by varying degrees of light and shade. Thus, upon scarlet the more shaded parts appear of a carmine, or on a straw-colour they appear of a golden-yellow.

If we pass beyond these limits, we arrive at unpleasant combinations, such as carmine and orange, or orange and straw-yellow. The distance of the colours must then be increased, so as to create pleasing combinations once more. The complementary colours are those which are most distant from each other. When these are combined, such, for instance, as straw-colour and ultramarine, or verdigris and purple, they have something insipid but crude; perhaps because we are prepared to expect the second colour to appear as an after-image of the first, and it does not sufficiently appear to be a new and independent element in the compound. Hence, on the whole, combinations of those pairs are most pleasing in which the second colour of the complementary tint is near the first, though with a distinct difference. Thus, scarlet and greenish blue are complementary. The combination produced when the greenish blue is allowed to glide either into ultramarine, or yellowish green (sap green), is still more pleasing. In the latter case, the combination tends towards yellow, and in the former, towards rose-red. Still more satisfactory combinations are those of three tints which bring about equilibrium in the impression of colour, and, notwithstanding the great body of colour, avoid a one-sided fatigue of the eye, without falling into the baldness of complementary tints. To this belongs the combination which the Venetian masters used so much--red, green, and violet; as well as Paul Veronese’s purple, greenish blue, and yellow. The former triad corresponds approximately to the three fundamental colours, in so far as these can be produced by pigments; the latter gives the mixtures of each pair of fundamental colours. It is however to be observed, that it has not yet been possible to establish rules for the harmony of colours with the same precision and certainty as for the consonance of tones. On the contrary, a consideration of the facts shows that a number of accessory influences come into play, when once the coloured surface is also to produce, either wholly or in part, a representation of natural objects or of solid forms, or even if it only offers a resemblance with the representation of a relief, of shaded and of non-shaded surfaces. It is moreover often difficult to establish, as a matter of fact, what are the colours which produce the harmonic impression. This is pre-eminently the case with pictures in which the aërial colour, the coloured reflection and shade, so variously alter the tint of each single coloured surface when it is not perfectly smooth, that it is hardly possible to give an indisputable determination of its tint. In such cases, moreover, the direct action of the colour upon the eye is only a subordinate means; for, on the other hand, the prominent colours and lights must also serve for directing the attention to the more important points of the representation. Compared with these more poetical and psychological elements of the representation, considerations as to the pleasing effect of the colours are thrown into the background. Only in the pure ornamentation on carpets, draperies, ribbons, or architectonic surfaces is there free scope for pure pleasure in the colours, and only there can it develop itself according to its own laws.

In pictures, too, there is not, as a general rule, perfect equilibrium between the various colours, but one of them preponderates to an extent which corresponds to the dominant light. This is occasioned, in the first case, by the truthful imitation of physical circumstances. If the illumination is rich in yellow light, yellow colours will appear brighter and more brilliant than blue ones; for yellow bodies are those which preferably reflect yellow light; while that of blue is only feebly reflected, and is mainly absorbed. Before the shaded parts of blue bodies, the yellow aërial light produces its effect, and imparts to the blue more or less of a grey tint. The same thing happens in front of red and green, though to a less extent, so that, in their shadows, these colours merge into yellow. This also is closely in accordance with the æsthetic requirements of artistic unity of composition in colour. This is caused by the fact that the divergent colours show a relation to the predominant colour, and point to it most distinctly in their shades. Where this is wanting, the various colours are hard and crude; and, since each one calls attention to itself, they make a motley and disturbing impression; and, on the other hand, a cold one, for the appearance of a flood of light thrown over the objects is wanting.

We have a natural type of the harmony which a well-executed illumination of masses of air can produce in a picture, in the light of the setting sun, which throws over the poorest regions a flood of light and colour, and harmoniously brightens them. The natural reason for this increase of aërial illumination lies in the fact, that the lower and more opaque layers of air are in the direction of the sun, and therefore reflect more powerfully; while at the same time the yellowish red colour of the light which has passed through the atmosphere becomes more distinct as the length of path increases which it has to traverse, and that further, this coloration is more pronounced as the background falls into shadow.

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In summing up once more these considerations, we have first seen what limitations are imposed on truth to Nature in artistic representation; how the painter links the principal means which nature furnishes of recognising depths in the field of view, namely binocular vision, which indeed is even turned against him, as it shows unmistakably the flatness of the picture; how therefore the painter must carefully select, partly the perspective arrangement of his subject, its position and its aspect, and partly the lighting and shading, in order to give us a directly intelligible image of its magnitude, its shape, and distance, and how a truthful representation of aërial light is one of the most important means of attaining the object.

We then saw that even the scale of luminous intensity, as met with in the objects, must be transformed in the picture to one differing sometimes by a hundredfold; how here, the colour of the object cannot be simply represented by the pigment; that indeed it is necessary to introduce important changes in the distribution of light and dark, of yellowish and of bluish tints.

The artist cannot transcribe Nature; he must translate her; yet this translation may give us an impression in the highest degree distinct and forcible, not merely of the objects themselves, but even of the greatly altered intensities of light under which we view them. The altered scale is indeed in many cases advantageous, as it gets rid of everything which, in the actual objects, is too dazzling, and too fatiguing for the eye. Thus the imitation of Nature in the picture is at the same time an ennobling of the impression on the senses. In this respect we can often give ourselves up more calmly and continuously, to the consideration of a work of art, than to that of a real object. The work of art can produce those gradations of light, and those tints in which the modelling of the forms is most distinct and therefore most expressive. It can bring forward a fulness of vivid fervent colours, and by skilful contrast can retain the sensitiveness of the eye in advantageous equilibrium. It can fearlessly apply the entire energy of powerful sensuous impressions, and the feeling of delight associated therewith, to direct and enchain the attention; it can use their variety to heighten the direct understanding of what is represented, and yet keep the eye in a condition of excitation most favourable and agreeable for delicate sensuous impressions.

If, in these considerations, my having continually laid much weight on the lightest, finest, and most accurate sensuous intelligibility of artistic representation, may seem to many of you as a very subordinate point--a point which, if mentioned at all by writers on æsthetics, is treated as quite accessory--I think this is unjustly so. The sensuous distinctness is by no means a low or subordinate element in the action of works of art; its importance has forced itself the more strongly upon me the more I have sought to discover the physiological elements in their action.

What effect is to be produced by a work of art, using this word in its highest sense? It should excite and enchain our attention, arouse in us, in easy play, a host of slumbering conceptions and their corresponding feelings, and direct them towards a common object, so as to give a vivid perception of all the features of an ideal type, whose separate fragments lie scattered in our imagination and overgrown by the wild chaos of accident. It seems as if we can only refer the frequent preponderance, in the mind, of art over reality, to the fact that the latter mixes something foreign, disturbing, and even injurious; while art can collect all the elements for the desired impression, and allow them to act without restraint. The power of this impression will no doubt be greater the deeper, the finer, and the truer to nature is the sensuous impression which is to arouse the series of images and the effects connected therewith. It must act certainly, rapidly, unequivocably, and with accuracy if it is to produce a vivid and powerful impression. These essentially are the points which I have sought to comprehend under the name of intelligibility of the work of art.

Then the peculiarities of the painters’ technique (Technik), to which physiological optical investigation have led us, are often closely connected with the highest problems of art. We may perhaps think that even the last secret of artistic beauty--that is, the wondrous pleasure which we feel in its presence--is essentially based on the feeling of an easy, harmonic, vivid stream of our conceptions, which, in spite of manifold changes, flow towards a common object, bring to light laws hitherto concealed, and allow us to gaze in the deepest depths of sensation of our own minds.

ON THE ORIGIN OF THE PLANETARY SYSTEM.

Lecture delivered in Heidelberg and in Cologne, in 1871.

It is my intention to bring a subject before you to-day which has been much discussed--that is, the hypothesis of Kant and Laplace as to the formation of the celestial bodies, and more especially of our planetary system. The choice of the subject needs no apology. In popular lectures, like the present, the hearers may reasonably expect from the lecturer, that he shall bring before them well-ascertained facts, and the complete results of investigation, and not unripe suppositions, hypotheses, or dreams.

Of all the subjects to which the thought and imagination of man could turn, the question as to the origin of the world has, since remote antiquity, been the favourite arena of the wildest speculation. Beneficent and malignant deities, giants, Kronos who devours his children, Niflheim, with the ice-giant Ymir, who is killed by the celestial Asas, that out of him the world may be constructed--these are all figures which fill the cosmogonic systems of the more cultivated of the peoples. But the universality of the fact, that each people develops its own cosmogonies, and sometimes in great detail, is an expression of the interest, felt by all, in knowing what is our own origin, what is the ultimate beginning of the things about us. And with the question of the beginning is closely connected that of the end of all things; for that which may be formed, may also pass away. The question about the end of things is perhaps of greater practical interest than that of the beginning.

Now, I must premise that the theory which I intend to discuss to-day was first put forth by a man who is known as the most abstract of philosophical thinkers; the originator of transcendental idealism and of the Categorical Imperative, Immanuel Kant. The work in which he developed this, the General Natural Philosophy and Theory of the Heavens, is one of his first publications, having appeared in his thirty-first year. Looking at the writings of this first period of his scientific activity, which lasted to about his fortieth year, we find that they belong mostly to Natural Philosophy, and are far in advance of their times with a number of the happiest ideas. His philosophical writings at this period are but few, and partly like his introductory lecture, directly originating in some adventitious circumstance; at the same time the matter they contain is comparatively without originality, and they are only important from a destructive and partially sarcastic criticism. It cannot be denied that the Kant of early life was a natural philosopher by instinct and by inclination; and that probably only the power of external circumstances, the want of the means necessary for independent scientific research, and the tone of thought prevalent at the time, kept him to philosophy, in which it was only much later that he produced anything original and important; for the Kritik der reinen Vernunft appeared in his fifty-seventh year. Even in the later periods of his life, between his great philosophical works, he wrote occasional memoirs on natural philosophy, and regularly delivered a course of lectures on physical geography. He was restricted in this to the scanty measure of knowledge and of appliances of his time, and of the out-of-the-way place where he lived; but with a large and intelligent mind he strove after such more general points of view as Alexander von Humboldt afterwards worked out. It is exactly an inversion of the historical connection, when Kant’s name is occasionally misused, to recommend that natural philosophy shall leave the inductive method, by which it has become great, to revert to the windy speculations of a so-called ‘deductive method.’ No one would have attacked such a misuse, more energetically and more incisively, than Kant himself if he were still among us.

The same hypothesis as to the origin of our planetary system was advanced a second time, but apparently quite independently of Kant, by the most celebrated of French astronomers, Simon, Marquis de Laplace. It formed, as it were, the final conclusion of his work on the mechanism of our system, executed with such gigantic industry and great mathematical acuteness. You see from the names of these two men, whom we meet as experienced and tried leaders in our course, that in a view in which they both agree, we have not to deal with a mere random guess, but with a careful and well-considered attempt to deduce conclusions as to the unknown past from known conditions of the present time.

It is in the nature of the case, that a hypothesis as to the origin of the world which we inhabit, and which deals with things in the most distant past, cannot be verified by direct observation. It may, however, receive direct confirmation, if, in the progress of scientific knowledge, new facts accrue to those already known, and like them are explained on the hypothesis; and particularly if survivals of the processes, assumed to have taken place in the formation of the heavenly bodies, can be proved to exist in the present.

Such direct confirmations of various kinds have, in fact, been formed for the view we are about to discuss, and have materially increased its probability.

Partly this fact, and partly the fact that the hypothesis in question has recently been mentioned in popular and scientific books, in connection with philosophical, ethical, and theological questions, have emboldened me to speak of it here. I intend not so much to tell you anything substantially new in reference to it, as to endeavour to give, as connectedly as possible, the reasons which have led to, and have confirmed it.