and carving would be, as we shall find (see § 118), a mistake, for wherever form reaches a really high standard of strength and refinement texture,' as mere play of surface, can be dispensed with without any loss. Texture' on a larger scale is however a legitimate architectural effect even in the most accomplished work. As the rustication or 'bossy' treatment of the surface of stonework, under conditions to be afterwards noticed (§ 134), it adds impressiveness to the lower stories of buildings in contrast to smoothed stonework above; again, as it has been remarked, in the distant view of a building the decorative sculpture, the mouldings and other features of detail, losing all definite shape, are merged in a general effect of Texture.

§ 80. Colour in Architecture.

Of colour as an effect in architecture it may briefly be noted, that since the various building materials, stone, brick, timber have considerable varieties of hue, it is a legitimate sphere of the architect's work so to choose and arrange them as to produce a pleasing colour-effect. To this extent an architect may even be said to compose in colour. It must however be understood that polychrome effects of colour are not of the essentials of the art. The architect can express himself perfectly in a single building-material without any colour or other surface decoration. This was done for example in the work of Sir Christopher Wren, but even here, in this very simple and noble form of the art, the hue of the single material counts for something. Wren owed nothing to the painter or the sculptor (who are fondly regarded by some as ministering spirits necessary to the welfare of architecture 1), but at the same time he was much

1 For this view see Mr. Ruskin's Preface to the 2d edition of The Seven Lamps of Architecture and The Two Paths.

CHAP.

Elements of architectural effect

121

aided by his material. The Portland stone, employed by Wren and others of the older London architects, is beautiful in hue and suits well the atmosphere of the metropolis. The contrast of the gleaming white of its rain-washed surfaces and the sooty blackness with which the smoke has invested its protected side is effective and pleasing, as any one can see who compares St. Martin's Church at Trafalgar Square with the Grand Hotel hard by, the stone of which has assumed a monotonous dull brown hue of the most uninteresting character. A fine building material is partly of moment for its look of preciousness, which increases the apparent value of the structure and hence adds to its grandeur, but it is also to be sought for its own beauty of colour and of surface. Such employment of a pleasing single building material, or of polychrome materials which can be arranged in large masses, in bands or stripes, or in a mosaic-like chequer, is a different thing from the painting of architecture indulged in so freely both in classical and mediæval days. Upon this practice of painting stonework either directly or over a thin coating of stucco, it may be remarked that we cannot consider it a matter of deliberate choice on the part of the ancients, for the practice of stone construction was among them largely based on a tradition of construction in wood. The stone temple of the Greeks and old Italians had been once a wooden temple and traces of timber practice remained on it throughout. Though this was not exactly the case with the forms of the medieval Christian Church, yet the Teutonic peoples possessed primeval traditions of wood construction which would influence them in whatever style they built. Now to paint woodwork is an obvious and necessary process, preservative as much as ornamental, but this is by no means the case with the more durable stone, the finer sorts of which have their own beauties of tint and of varied surface.

Hence we may

regard painted stone architecture as a survival from painted wood architecture, and exclude colour applied in this way from the list of architectural effects that are of the essentials of the art. Architecture then presents us with Masses, Lines, effects of Light - and - Shade and of Texture, and pleasing appearances of colour over large surfaces.

§ 81. The Elements of Effect in Sculpture: distinction between Sculpture in the round and Relief.

The sculptor, like the architect, presents us with objects of three dimensions that offer us varying contours with effects of light - and - shade and texture, but in this case the objects are imitations of natural forms, most usually those of the human body and of the higher animals.

In dealing with the plastic art it is inconvenient to separate sculpture in the round from sculpture in relief. In the case of sculpture in the round the representation of nature is direct. A solid object is copied in all its three dimensions, and the work of art does not merely produce the impression of solid form but is actually in itself that form. In the case of the graphic art, whatever the impression we receive, there is never anything before us but a variously coloured and illumined surface of two dimensions only. Sculpture in relief however comes between the two, and partakes of the nature of graphic as well as of plastic art. Relief sculpture indeed begins at the same point as painting, and the two arts are in early times inseparably united. The outline sketched on wooden panel or slab of stone is the first operation in both these arts. This outline may then be incised so that the bounding line becomes a groove like that made by the V-tool of the wood-carver, but the delineation is still graphic. If the part within the outline is tinted or shaded to represent nature we have the

CHAP. I Elements of effect in Sculpture

123

beginning of painting, but if on the contrary it is rounded off towards the bottom of the groove, so as in any way to indicate the thickness of the object represented, then, however slight the relief thus produced, the result is a piece of plastic art. From this point more and more roundness and modelling can be added to the relief, while on his part the graphic artist can go on adding within the original outline as much light and shade and colour as he pleases. A certain graphic character will however always belong to the relief even when boldly modelled. The subject tells out primarily as a surface within a definite outline; and this surface is directly presented to the eye as in the graphic art. The third dimension or thickness of the object, on the other hand, is in relief-work only partially represented, not fully, as in sculpture in the round. Actual depth is shown, but not to the full extent required, the rest having to be made up by suggestion. In other words the third dimension of space is in relief sculpture expressed to some extent by a convention. The particular conventions of low and high relief by which the impression of solid form in its full depth is conveyed to the eye, together with certain points in the management of light-and-shade specially applicable to relief-work, will be noticed in the chapter on sculpture (§§ 163 ff.), and need not further concern us here.

§ 82. The forms presented in Sculpture.

The solid forms presented to us in sculpture are such as we can handle and embrace, and waken in us all the associations we have been accustomed to connect with shapes in nature which may be touched and clasped. Such being the case, the question suggests itself whether or not sculpture addresses itself actually, as well as ideally and through association, to the sense of touch jointly with the

sense of sight. If we measure a building by ourselves moving about it and around it, do we not in a corresponding manner estimate sculptured form by touching it?

6

This question happens to be raised in a curious passage in the Commentaries of the Florentine sculptor Lorenzo Ghiberti, in which he remarks of a certain newly discovered antique statue that it had very many charms of such a kind that the sight cannot apprehend them, either in a strong or a tempered light; only the hand by its touch can discover them,' ‚'1 and it may be asked whether the observation is one of general application. Few artists have been endowed with a more refined appreciation of form than Ghiberti; did he really consider that part of the effect of sculpture was derived from the sense of touch? It is obvious that in practice the application of the finger-tips to a finished work of sculpture would quickly result in unpleasing mementoes of the contact, while in time the surface texture, upon which many sculptors set such store, would suffer actual abrasion. It is clear therefore that works of the plastic art are made to be looked at, not handled, yet on the other hand the sense of touch is freely exercised during their production. The artist, working from the life, will actually feel his model, to assist him in securing the particular quality he desires in a subtly modelled part like the knee, and will test his own work in the same way by touch as well as by the eye.

§ 83. Contour, Light-and-Shade, Texture and Colour in Sculpture.

Apart from the impression of solid form, a large part of the artistic effect of sculpture depends on contour. Sculp

1 Commentario III, in Le Monnier's Vasari, Firenze, 1846, etc., i. p. xii.