Indian Sculpture

But a sculptor must be careful to choose a subject which he understands and loves. His is perhaps the most enduring craft and many are the miscreations that live too long. Often without more than a few hours of thought he will start a work which will take him years to complete and which may exist for centuries. Thus sculpture must have a fundamental meaning and the artist should think of it as existing not only for his contemporaries but for generations to come. For this reason he must deal with those quali ties which all men comprehend. By this it is not suggested that a meaning which is involved or literary can be employed. Such meanings are not sufficiently universal, and the contemplation which is necessary before the sculptor begins work should consist of preliminary observation, the assembling of notes made at previous times, and those trial sketches recording things which he may forget in the heat of his actual work. It is said that famous painters of the Far East often merge themselves in con templation of the silk upon which they are going to develop a work of art, and that they do not permit themselves to make even the lightest line suggestive of the composition, for the reason that the first touch of brush to silk to a certain degree commits them, and masses, rhythms and lines can be more easily moved in the imagination before this first lightest touch has begun the crystal lization of what they wish to do. Many great sculptors have weak ened their work by not devoting an amount of time in considera tion proportionate to that expended in the actual labour. This was especially true of Michelangelo who in the great vigour of his mind sometimes created beings that seemed to wish to reach outside the block of stone. (See SCULPTURE TECHNIQUE: flodel ing, Theory.) having selected the subject and model it is necessary to choose certain characteristics and to eliminate those extraneous details which do not form an inherent and component part of its being. This is the artist's privilege, nay, it is almost the heart of his work, and selection must be thought out carefully. Many modern artists are carrying this privilege so far that their work eliminates all possibility for those blending chords of characteristics that develop in a fine portrait sculpture as rightly as in organ music. Thus the "Portrait of Mme. Pogany" by Brancusi (see SCULPTURE PORTRAIT, Plate X., fig. 3) when compared with the other two portraits on the page, that of "Lafayette" by Houdon and that of "Admiral Farragut" by Charles Grafly, seems childlike in its simplicity. The work of the true portrait sculptor as seen in the other two, shows all the com plications of the characters portrayed, but reduces them to a meaningful whole. It is difficult to understand why in these days of diversity of interest and complications of existence some artists should choose to show less in their work than did many of the more primitive peoples. Compare the Brancusi head (Plate X., fig. 3 of SCULPTURE) with Plate IX. One must agree that this simplified characterisation can hardly be more than an affectation, for the result does not gain in the distinction of design, which is demonstrated in the negro head of Plate IX., fig. 8, of SCULPTURE, and to which Brancusi's work is distinctly inferior in the por trayal of character. Thus character portrayal and accent are not caricature, nor are they the assumed attitude of a theorist.

Association With Surroundings.

Sculptors have found it necessary to specialize in certain fields, because they have found it necessary to study not only the problems of their work in itself but those which are involved in adapting it to its intended surroundings. In the foregoing articles certain broad truths have been pointed out, but the reader must realize that these are only samples of the problems which must be solved, for not only must the sculptor who is making portraits be a student of craniology, physiognomy and anthropometry, but he who is working for the enhancement of the beauty of a building must be properly equipped with a knowledge of periods of architecture and decora tive styles, their reason for being and their influences. Each division in this field of art has its problems of application, whether it be portrait, architectural, garden, monumental or any other branch of sculpture, and whether it be large or small, bronze or stone, designed to be shown indoors or out-of-doors, on an eminence or level with the eyes.

Psychological Balance.

Sculptors, of all artists, feel the necessity for a proper balance, because of the enduring quality of their art, while painters are often the first to take up the en thusiasms of the day, and to drop them. In recent years there has been a great wave of interest in the subjective ; man searches his inner being with interest in an endeavour to find that which he has not been able to find outside himself. Perhaps this tend ency is due to the declining power of religion and it has been suggested that men are no longer moved as were those of the Middle Ages in the worship of a god and now search for a god within themselves. In art there has been a revolt against the strongly objective viewpoint of the academist, for realism was carried in the 19th century to its ultimate climax. The impression ists were not concerned with reality but were interested only in their impression of things, in catching the fleeting moment, and thus their work grew swifter and swifter in the hope that they could catch quickly passing glimpses of light and colour. Sculptors only distantly followed this movement. However, after the im pressionists, various groups of distortionists who were sculptors as well as painters, carved and twisted reality until all semblance of meaning was lost and no one could guess with what model the artist had begun his work. In defense of all this, artists said that they were "expressing themselves," an argument which though not complimentary to their reason was nevertheless unanswerable, for who could tell what another saw or did not see? This reaction against the too objective viewpoint of the 19th century is a healthy one and was necessary in the development of the evolution of art, but there is nowadays among artists a grow ing understanding that a readjustment will be necessary and of all artists the sculptors appreciate best the necessity of balance between the objective and the subjective, the factual and the imaginative, that which can be observed in the artist's world, and that which the inner being of the artist imposes upon it.

The primitive artist first makes as good a copy as he can of the object he is attempting to portray and then feeling a lack in its static quality resorts to various devices to indicate its move ment. In doing so he combines what he actually sees, the objec tive, with what he feels, the subjective ; and every artist does the same, for nothing in nature is quite good enough to satisfy the artist; he must improve on it a little. Nothing in nature exactly fits with the spirit of his mood and thought, and therefore he must mould it the better to suit his expression. It is this subjective quality which, along with his technique, creates what we call the artist's style, for in it we see something of the man himself ; we see the object which he is portraying through his eyes, coloured by his emotions, illuminated by his dreams and enriched by his knowledge. But this style should never be con sciously imposed upon the theme in such a way as to obscure it, for the artist's true endeavour is to make it possible for his fel lowmen to see more clearly and with more feeling than they could without him. In order to accomplish his purpose he may make a round breast rounder to point out its roundness, or in like manner accent or suppress any quality of light or shade, strength or weakness, vigour or impassivity, any emotion, any association, or any other reaction which he may choose to employ, if the power of his work upon his fellowmen can thereby be in creased, so that it enlightens and instructs them in the experience of the beautiful, and broadens their understanding. The grotesque of the Renaissance may be as great art as the placid figures of an Amida Buddha, for art, like science, is not concerned with right and wrong, good and bad. Its urge is to broaden and explain, to impart feelings which could never be expressed in words, and which may never have been felt or expressed in just that indi vidual way before. Thus it makes us understand almost as though we ourselves had experienced all that the artist has.