Line and Form (1900) Part 14

To place informal shaded flowers and leaves upon a carpet, for instance, where the warp is very emphatic, and the process of weaving necessitates a stepped or rectangularly broken outline, is to mistake appropriate decorative effect, capacity of material, and position in regard to the eye. We cannot get away, in a carpet, from the idea of a flat field starred with more or less formal flowers, and colour arrangements which owe their richness and beauty, not to the relief of shading, but to the heraldic principle of relieving one tint or colour upon another. The rich inlay of colour which a Persian or any Eastern carpet presents is owing to its being designed upon this principle; and in Persian work that peculiarly rich effect of colour, apart from fine material, is owing to the principle of the use of outlines of different colours defining and relieving the different forms in the pattern upon different grounds. The rectangular influence arising from the technical conditions of the work gives a definite textile character to the design which is very agreeable; besides, as a question of line and form, in a carpet or rug which is rectangular in shape and laid usually upon rectangular floors, the squareness of form harmonizes with the conditions and surroundings of the work in use. The Persian designer, indeed, appears to be so impressed with this feeling, that he uses a succession of borders around the central field of his carpet or rug, still further emphasizing the rectangularity; while he avoids the too rigid effect of a series of straight lines which the crossing of the threads of the weft at right angles to the warp might cause, by changing the widths of his subsidiary borders and breaking them with a constant variety of small patterns, and inserting narrow white lines between the black lines of the border.

[Ill.u.s.tration (f127): Sketch to Ill.u.s.trate Treatment of Borders in a Persian Rug.]

[Effect of Texture on Colour]

In tapestry the effect of the emphatic warp worked vertically in the loom, but hung horizontally, has a very important influence upon the effect. If we took a piece of paper coloured with a flat even tint, and folded it in ridges, the quality of the tint would be at once changed, and so in tapestry the pa.s.sing of the wool of the wefts, which form the pattern or picture, over the strong lines of the warp--which are broad enough to take the outlines of the cartoon upon them--produces that soft and varied play of colour--really colour in light and shade--which, over and above the actual dyes and artistic selection of tints, gives the peculiar charm and effect in tapestry.

This sheen and variety are more or less evident in all textiles, and a good textile pattern only adds to the variety and richness of the surface. The different thicknesses or planes of surface and the difference of their texture caused by the different wefts being brought to the surface of the cloth or silk (from the simplest contrast of line presented by the simplest arrangements of warp and weft, to the complexities of many-coloured silk stuffs and brocade) alone give a value to the surface pattern.

In cut velvet the same principle of contrast of surface is emphasized still further, the rich deep nap of the less raised parts contrasting pleasantly with the mat effect of the ground.

In designs for such material one should aim at boldly blocked-out patterns in silhouette--bold leaf and fruit forms say--designed on the principle of the stencil.

[Prints]

With prints the range is of course freer, the material itself suggesting something lighter and more temporary. It seems highly probable that printed cotton was originally a subst.i.tute for embroidered linen or more sumptuous materials. There are certainly instances of very similar patterns in Indian and Persian work in silk embroidery, and also in printed cotton. In some cases the print is partly embroidered, which seems to mark a transitional stage, and recalls the lingering use of illumination in the early days of the printing press, in another department of art.

Anything that will repeat as a pattern in what can be produced by line, dot, and tints of colour, and engraved upon wood-blocks or copper rollers, can be printed of course; and, as is generally the case with an art which has no very obvious technical limitations, it is liable to be caught by the imitative spirit, and cheap and rapid production and demand for novelties (so-called) generally end in loss of taste and deterioration of quality, especially in design. From the artistic point of view we can only correct this by bearing in mind similar considerations to those which hold good as general principles and guides in designing for textiles generally, having regard to the object, purpose, and position--to the ultimate use of the material, and differentiating our designs, as in the case of other textile design accordingly.

Thus in the matter of plan and direction of line and character of form we shall at once find natural distinctions and divisions, as our design is for hanging, or spreading horizontally, or wearing; and these different functions will also determine scale and choice and treatment of form and colour.

There is no doubt that with patterns printed more range may be allowed than with patterns to be woven, where line and form are both controlled by the necessities of being reproduced by so many points to the inch. At the same time the object of all design and pattern work being the greatest beauty compatible with the material and conditions, one should seek, not such effects as merely test the capacity or ingenuity of the machine, but rather such as appear to be most decoratively appropriate and effective.

There appears to be no _mechanical_ reason why cotton should not be printed all over with landscapes and graphic sketches, and people clothe themselves with them as with Christmas numbers, or turn their couches, chairs, and curtains into sc.r.a.p alb.u.ms, but there is every reason _on the score of taste_ why these things should not be done.

[Ill.u.s.tration (f129): (1) Contrasting Surfaces of Warp and Weft in Woven Silk Hanging; (2) Stencil Principle.]

With any textile, as I have said, we are as designers dealing with surface. It is surface ornament that is wanted also in printed cotton.

Now good line and form and pure tints have the best effect, because they do not break the surface into holes, and give a ragged or tumbled appearance, which accidental bunches of darkly-shaded flowers in high relief undoubtedly do. If small rich detail and variety are wanted, we should seek it in the inventive spirit of the Persian and Indian, and break our solid colours with mordants or arabesques in colour of delicate subsidiary pattern instead of using coa.r.s.e planes of light and shadow, or showing up ragged and unrelated forms upon violent grounds.

[Ill.u.s.tration (f130): Indian Printed Cotton Cover: South Kensington Museum.]

The true idea of a print pattern is of something gay and fanciful: bright and fresh in colour, and clear in line and form: a certain quaintness is allowable, and in purely floral designs there is room for a considerable degree of what might be called naturalism, so far as good line-drawing and understanding of flower form goes, emphasis of colour being sought by means of _planes of colour_, rather than by planes of shadow.

I had intended to touch upon other provinces of design, but I have taken up so much s.p.a.ce with those I have been discussing already that I can only now briefly allude to these.

[Wall-Paper]

Of wall-paper, which may be regarded in the light of more or less of a subst.i.tute for mural painting, and also textile wall-hangings, much the same general principles and many of the same remarks apply as have been already used in regard to mural decoration. The designer has much freedom as to motive, and his ingenuity is only bounded by or concentrated in a square of twenty-one inches. If he has succeeded in making an agreeable pattern which will repeat not too obviously over an indefinite s.p.a.ce, to form a not obtrusive background, and which can be printed and sold to the ordinary citizen, he is supposed to have satisfied the conditions.

But he may be induced to go further and attempt the design of a complete decoration as far as dado, field, frieze, and ceiling go; and this would involve all the thought necessary to the mural painter, narrowed down to the exigencies of mechanical repeat.

Allied to the wall is the window, and in glazing and the art of the gla.s.s-painter we have another very distinct and beautiful sphere of line design. In plain leading the same law of covering vertical surface holds good as to selection of plan and system of line: almost any simple geometric net is appropriate, if not too complex or small in form to hold gla.s.s or to permit lead to follow its lines. Leaded panels of roundels (or "bull's eyes") of plain gla.s.s have a good effect in cas.e.m.e.nts where a sparkle of light rather than outward view is sought for.

[Stained Gla.s.s]

When we come to designing for stained gla.s.s we should still bear in mind the fundamental net of lead lines which forms the basis of our pattern, or gla.s.s picture, as it were: and the designer's object should be to make it good as an arrangement of line independently of the colour, while practical to the glazier.

[Ill.u.s.tration (f131): (1) Stained Gla.s.s Treatment: Inclosure of Form and Colour by Lead Lines; (2) Sections.]

Although lead is very pliable, too much must not be expected of it in the way of small depressions and angles: the boundary lines of the figures, which should be the boldest of all, should be kept as simple as possible, not only on this account, but because complex outlines cannot well be cut in gla.s.s. A head, for instance, is inclosed in sweeping line, and the profile defined within the lead line by means of painting.

A hand would be defined on the same principle. Each different colour demands a different inclosure of lead, although in the choice of gla.s.s much variation of tint can be obtained, as in the case of pot metal running from thin to thick gla.s.s, which intensifies the colour, and many kinds of what is called flashed. Yet to the designer, from the point of view of line, gla.s.s design is a kind of translucent mosaic, in which the primal technical necessity of the leading which holds the glory of the coloured light together, really enhances its splendour, and in affording opportunities for decoration and expressive linear composition imparts to the whole work its particular character and beauty.

This after all is the principle to cling to in all designing, to adapt our designs to the particular distinctive character and beauty of the material for which they are destined, to endeavour to think them out in those materials, and not only on paper. Whatever the work may be--carving, inlays, modelling, mosaic, textiles--through the whole range of surface decoration, we should think out our designs, not only in relation to the limitations of their material, but also in their relation to each other, to their effect in actual use, and even to their possible use in a.s.sociation together, which, of course, is of paramount importance in designing a complete room or any comprehensive piece of decoration.

And when we leave plane surfaces and seek to invent appropriate, that is to say, _expressive_ ornament allied to concave and convex surfaces, to the varied forms of pottery for instance, metal-work, and gla.s.s vessels, furniture, and accessories of all kinds, we shall find the same laws and principles hold good which should guide us in all design--to adapt design to the characteristics and conditions of the material, to its structural capacity, its use and purpose, as well as to use or invention in line, both as a controlling plan or base of ornament, as well as a means of the a.s.sociation and expression of form.

CHAPTER X

Of the Expression and Relief of Line and Form by _Colour_--Effect of same Colour upon different Grounds--Radiation of Colour--White Outline to clear Colours--Quality of Tints relieved upon other Tints--Complementaries--Harmony--The Colour Sense--Colour Proportions--Importance of Pure Tints--Tones and Planes--The Tone of Time--Pattern and Picture--A Pattern not necessarily a Picture, but a Picture in principle a Pattern--Chiaroscuro--Examples of Pattern-work and Picture-work--Picture-patterns and Pattern-pictures.

Perhaps the most striking means of the expression of relief of line and form, certainly the most attractive, is by colour. By colour we obtain the most complete and beautiful means of expression in art.

[Relief of Line and Form by Colour]

Our earliest ideas of form are probably derived through the different colours of objects around us, by which they are thrown into relief upon the background, or against other objects; and, as I mentioned in the first chapter, we reach outline by observing the edges of different ma.s.ses relieved as dark or light upon light or dark grounds, so now, in my last, we come again to the consideration of the definition of line and form by colour, and their relief and expression upon different planes or fields of colour.

There is first the colour of the object itself--the local colour--and then the colour of the ground upon which it is relieved, both of which in their action and reaction upon each other will greatly affect the value of the local colour and the degree of relief of the form upon it.

One of the best and simplest ways to ascertain the real value of a colour and its effect upon different grounds or fields is to take a flower--say a red poppy, and place it against a white paper ground, blocking in the local colour as relieved upon white, as near as may be to its full strength, with a brush, and defining the form as we go along. Then try the same flower upon grounds of different tints--green, blue, yellow--and it will be at once perceived what a different value and expression the same form in the same colour has upon different tinted grounds. A scarlet poppy would appear clearest and darkest upon white; it would show a tendency upon a blue ground to blend or blur at its edges, and also on yellow and green to a less extent.

[Ill.u.s.tration (f132): Sketch to Show Effect of the Same Colour and Form upon Different Coloured Grounds.]

It is this tendency to lose the edges of forms owing to the radiation of colours, and to mingle with the colour of the background, which makes a strong outline so constantly a necessity in decorative work. One may use a black on a white, a brown, or a gold outline (as in cloisonne), the nature of the outline being generally determined by the nature of the work. In stained gla.s.s the outline must be black, and this black is of the greatest value in enhancing by opposition the brilliance of the colours of the gla.s.s it incloses, stopping out the light around it as it does in solid lead when placed in the window.

[Ill.u.s.tration (f133): (1) Principle of the Effect of the Blending or Blurring of Colours at Their Edges; (2) Use of Black and White Outline to Clear the Edges of Coloured Forms upon Different Coloured Grounds.]

[Clearing Coloured Forms]

A white outline produced by a resist or a mordant in a printed textile, where the colours used are full and rich, often has a good effect, lightening the effect while giving point and definition to certain leading forms. Instances of the use of white outlines may be found in Eastern carpets, where the main colours, being dark blue and yellows on rich red, are relieved in parts by a dull white outline. Also in Persian carpets of the sixteenth or seventeenth century, the scrollwork in red is often relieved by an ivory white outline on blue.

It is always a good practice in blocking in flowers, either from nature or as parts of a design, to leave a white outline at the junctions--that is to say, where one petal overlaps another, or where there is a joint in the stem, or a fold in the leaf--and to show the ribbings, markings, and divisions of flower and leaf.

By judiciously changing the quality of our tints it is possible to make different colours in a pattern tell clearly. To relieve red upon blue, for instance, one would use an orange red upon greenish blue, or scarlet upon a gray blue--the general principle being apparently a kind of compensating balance between colours, so that in taking from one you give to another.

A full red and blue used together, as we have seen, would show a tendency to purple, unless separated by outlines; so that if the blue was full and rich, the red would have to approach brown or russet; or if the red was a full one--a crimson red--the blue would have to approach green.

[Harmony]

This may be because of the necessary complements in colours, which we see in nature, and which prepossess the eye, and make it demand these modifications to satisfy the sense of harmony.

When daylight struggles with candle- or lamp-light, one may notice that upon the white cloth of a dinner-table the light is blue and the shadows yellow or orange--the orange deepening as with the fading daylight the blue grows deeper, until the colour of the light and the shadow change places. The same principle may be noticed in firelight, but the redder the flame the greener will be the shadows.

Harmony in colour may be said to consist--apart from the general acknowledgment of the law of complementaries, in giving quality to the raw pigments by gradation, by a certain admixture or infusion of other colours.