As an example of fine description of Gothic architecture, the fol lowing is quoted from Victor Hugo on the Cathedral of Notre Dame: Its front showed in succession and together: three ogive carved-in great doors; the embroidered and lace-worked ribbon-band of its twenty-eight niches for the statues of kings of Israel and Judah ; an immense rose window flanked by two side-windows, as a priest is by his deacon and subdeacon ; the high, frail gallery of trefoil arcades carrying a heavy platform on its slender colonnades; and finally, the two black, massive towers with their sloping roof-sheds. All these were the harmonious parts of a magnificent whole, piled up one above the other in five gigantic storeys, broadening out before the eye without confusing it with all their countless details of statuary, sculpture and carving, all powerfully "drawn in" to help along the quest of grandeur of the whole building. It was a vast symphony in stone, so to say, the colossal work of one man and one people, a complete composite whole like the "Iliad," whose sister it is. The prodigious product of a union of all the forces of an age, on whose every stone we see stand out in a hundred ways, the fancy of the workman disciplined by the genius of the artist. In a word, it is a human creation as strong and as fruitful as the divine creation from which it seems to have borrowed its double nature ; variety and eternity. And what has been said of the whole church, of the Cathedral of Notre Dame, applies to all these Christian churches of the Middle Ages. All is contained in this, developed out of itself, logical and well-proportioned. If you measure the giant's big toe, you have measured the giant ! French.—Apart from French Gothic, we have a wonderful period of sculpture in France related to architecture. For a time there was a decided tendency to keep the sculpture from being at all realistic, resulting in a type that was very wooden in char acter. It was actually more architecture than sculpture, and there is always a moment when architecture and sculpture clearly meet. Sometimes they overlap; architecture becomes sculpture and sculpture becomes architecture, as in the case of the work of some of our present day modernists. "The Dance," for instance, on the façade of the Grand Opera House in Paris tends toward the realistic, yet it has perfect balance. The other groups on the façade are stiff and wooden in comparison. There is a story to the effect that when "The Dance," by Carpeaux, was put up, it was so hated that acids and ink were thrown over the marble. Discoloration can be seen to the present day.
The two types of sculpture are manifest in the Arc de Triomphe. The marvelous group of "The Marseillaise," by Rude, is very realistic in its movement and modelling, superb and courageous in its design, but it still holds its place in its architec tural balance with such perfection that the other groups seem rigid, and so much like architecture itself that the fine, relieving note is lost. Yet, at the time these works were set in place, the less beautiful groups were admired as much as, if not more than, the Rude group. Now, there is no question in the minds of the artists and laymen which group of the Arc de Triomphe is the greatest.
The Louvre has its succession of fine pieces of architectural sculpture, among them some lions by Barye, and a beautiful pedi ment group by Carpeaux called "Flora." The bridges over the Seine in a later period come in for their share of architectural sculpture, but few of them have the solidity and power of the Rude and Carpeaux groups. They seem to be rather of the ex plosive type of sculpture, with broken silhouettes and flaring lines which weaken the groups to such an extent that they seem meagre and poor—particularly those of the Pont Alexander III. and also the groups on the Grand Palais near the north end of that famous bridge.
Rodin, one of the greatest French artists, was a superb model ler, with once in a while a sense of power and volume that tended toward making sculpture particularly architectural, but he was more often lacking in the sense of sculpture fitted to architecture. His "Gates of Hell" are famous mostly for the beautiful bits of modelling and design rather than from a sense of their fitness to architecture. It may be said of Rodin that he constantly demands that sculpture shall express moods and conditions which more properly belong to other arts.
It is interesting to note the changes in types of architecture. This has many causes, such as utilitarianism, climate, religion and geography. In New York it may be attributed to the fact that spaces are small and elevators are used so extensively. The build ings are carried into the air rather than along the ground, and the results have been a new type of sculpture. Other examples are the Nebraska State Capitol, the Kansas City war memorial, and nearly all city buildings. The sculpture seems to grow from the architec ture into realistic forms of living things, either plant or animal, tending toward the modernistic types. Bas-relief is being used as much as it was used by the Egyptians. This keeps sculpture and architecture on the same plane, but it thereby loses in richness and a difference of plane which was sought after by architects and sculptors of the past. Even the figures which are supposed to represent sculpture in the round are flattened in parts, with the torso, arms and heads growing into the full round. Other evidences that architecture is meeting sculpture and that sculpture is grow ing into architecture is shown in the fact that architecture is becoming more fluid and sculpture more rigid. This may lead to something that has never been done before, but more likely this sameness of treatment will be detrimental to both architecture and sculpture.
With the possibilities that concrete brings to architecture and sculpture, there is only the hope that good taste will prevail to such an extent as to prevent art from succumbing to the ease with which this material can be used, making a period approximate to the one after the invention of the jig-saw, when all façades and front porches were made of ginger-bread design, owing to the facility with which the work could be accomplished. This tend ency to merge architecture and sculpture presents the likelihood of missing something fine in not adhering to what Shakespeare speaks of as "excellent differences." Composition is subtle and almost incomprehensible, but there are in all great sculptural pieces certain vital requirements. The first is volume, including shape ; the second is the intricate lacing of the parts in rhythm; and the third and most vital is perfect feeling, or the co-ordination of the body into a whole. The brain can think one thought at a time; that thought makes the body one rhythmic gesture under the same central thought control. This follows through groups of people, as shown by the fact that the controlling person in a party is the moving power of all others; otherwise the individuals that compose a group of people are not perfectly harmonious. In an equestrian statue the horse must be dominated and controlled by the spirit of the rider. The great dif ference between the Colleoni and the Gattamelata is that the rider of the one is filled with verve and energy, which is reflected in the horse, whereas the rider in the other is philosophic, quiet and dignified, qualities also depicted in the horse that he rides. Any one of these vital points left out of the composition would mean that the work was not a masterpiece.
There is no end to the variety of conceptions if these themes are adhered to. What has been done in sculpture, as well as the other arts, is merely a scratch on the 3urface; those who say that everything has been done cannot visualize the untold possibilities of sculpture in its relationship to architecture. (See other sections of this article, such as Decorative Sculpture; Monumental Sculp ture: also articles under SCULPTURE TECHNIQUE.) ( J. E. FR.)