The Tipton advertiser., 1876-11-09
Nature ~ an Artist.

N0tUTe ~ An Aftuots
Ifyou wish to study colors
you shall find more variety and depth
and brilliancy at the seaside than In
any landscape. l doubt IL Brazilian
forests, enriched by the plumage o.
birds that are SO brilliant as to make
"the rash gazer wipe his eye" car
match the colors of shells, stones
waves and fishes. The only spectacle
! comparable to it is sky at sunset and
at dawn, or the deep midnight vault
set with stars. Imagine the streets ol
the New Jerusalem; nay, fancy city
avenue paved with emeralds, rubies
sapphires, with here and there q dia-
mond-that's what the broad beach al
the Branch is when the waves wash
the variegated pebbles and the shells
which surpass the hues Of rainbow
or those on doves neck. Huxley
had been telling the New Workers all
about the creation, how this came
from that, how types remained stead
fast If circumstances or conditions
were constant, but varied and passed
into new forms or features as surround
ings changed. For my part, should
have liked better to have had him
speak of things close at hand, and tell
me, for instance, how these marvellous
colors got into the shell of this fish
that the waves washed up out of the
deep at my feet. 1t is painted as no
hand can do it, and with more skill
full brush even than that which paint
ed the vast banks of foliage OH the
Allegheny mountains that are '.just
splendid" in October; this shell was
painted, too, in deep water, when it
was plum full of mussel or fish
Here is an effect quite as wonderful as
creation in the "Miltonian account"
that Huxley spurns. Or ii he would
tell me how these pebbles were stained,
dyed, painted In colors that are in
finite in shade and hue. l should be
much obliged to him. Or let him tell
me why Jim Cunningham's or George
Rodman's mustache is red while mine
is jet black! Or would he tell me how
these fishes the fishermen brought In
managed to extract from the sad sea
waves and from their food the trans
cendent colors, that make each OF them
thing of beauty and joy forever
until they are fried and laid on your
plate. This would be information
worth having, and creation might go
to grass. never saw such pigments,
such a museum of color organized in
shell, and stone, and fish. And as for
the waves, l had seen pictures so high
| ly wrought that could not believe the
artist had copied exactly. Turner's
slave ship ocean piece is sample.
One who had not seen the ocean would
pronounce his sea impossible, in spite
Of Ruskin; and the canvases Of Church
and Bierstadt, fixing the evanescent
colors of Niagara, and the golden
dreamy haziness and the rich blue and
gold Of Sierra scenery, seem exaggera-
tions; but since have seen Nature
mix the paints in the Alleghanies and
in the mountains off the Hudson, and
have for hours studied the colors Of
the sea-the far-ofF waters SO blue that
| / could not tell where the ocean Of
water left off and the ocean Of sky be-
gan until saw the white sails of ships
coming up "from the underworld"
and sailing straight into the heavens,
and the near waters breaking into
emerald and PEARL have concluded
that painters do not and cannot ex-
aggerate; the intenscr the colors and
the more impossible the combinations,
the truer is the copy. For Nature is
not SO much form as she is color; she
wraps the forms in color; it il all
paint. "Great is paint; nay, God is
the painter" says Emerson. 1t is this
enamel, this fine veneering, this beau
tiful complexion, that makes paint
ing, in my poor judgment, SO much
superior as a branch of art to sculpture.
Marble forms, even when draped so
delicately that your senses are de-
ceived, are very dead things, as dead
us mummies defunct for thousands Of
years; but there are always life and
youth and beauty in the colors Of eye,
lips and hair, and in rich, clear COM
plexion that is the finest thing about
the human body. The painter deals
with form and color, and color is the
main thing; and he has a broader
range, for the sculptor is shut up to
few forms, and does not treat land
scape, waterscape, skyscape. But /
cannot understand why people fool
away their time looking at marbles,
bronzes and can vases, when they have
the sea, the sky, the mountains, and
the human form divine to look at. 1t
is misunderstanding at a gnat
and swallowing caramel.-Ed. Cor.
Washington Press.