The Dalles times-mountaineer. [volume] (The Dalles, Or.) 1882-1904, 1896-11-28
JAPANESE ART.
Queer Effects of Tradition Upon
the Native Artists.
Methods OF the Masters Carried Out to n,
Exsegerated Extent by the Disciples
OF Gheir Respective Schools-Pe.
culiarities OF Flower Work.

Japanese drawings of flowers-and
they usually draw them beautifully
are often influenced in some way by a
tradition. The man who invented the
method was true impressionist, writes
Alfred Parsons in Harper's Magazine.
lie seized what appeared to him char
acteristic OF The plant, and insisted on
that to the exclusion of other truths,
thus founding q mannerism which all
following artists initiated. In time,
what he saw as characteristic became
exaggerated by his disciples, who
looked ut nature only through his ewes
and not with their own, and have OBJ.
served that the flowers which are most
frequently drawn are not so like the
originals as those less popular ones de-
picted in books of botany and such
like, for drawing which there is no rec
ognized method, and where the
draughtsman relied entirely on his
own observation for his facts, Take,
tor example, the spots on the lotus
stems; if you look very closely you can
see that there are spots, but certainly
they could not strike every artist as
are not visible three yards away, But
some master noticed them many years
ago and spotted his stems, and now they
all spot them, and the spots geS bigger
and bigger, and so it will be until some
original genius arises VINO will not be
content with other peoples eyes, but
will dare to look for himself, and he
may perhaps, without abandoning Jap
anese methods, get nearer to nature
and start renaissance in japanese
art. The Japanese treatment Of land
scape is not more conventional that of
Claude or David Cox, or than the short-
hand of our pencil sketches. but it re-
cords facts in a different way.
The everlasting question in art is the
imitation of nature; it has never been
carried farther in certain directions
than by Millais and his pre-Raphaelite
brethren, or In others than by Manet,
Monet and the modern French, but no
one can put in everything; look at
simple bunch of leaves in sunlight |
against a wall, and think how long it |
would take to really initiate all their
of form, color, and light |
Blu sudue' some IdctS can only De given I
by ignoring others, and the question |
what is the important thing which must !
be insisted on Is the personal affair of !
each individual artist in every country
where art is unfettered and alive, But
IN japanese. as in byzantine and other ,
eastern arts, this question Is still de-
'ided by the practice of past genera
ions, and it will take all the vitality
of strong man to infuse new life into
It without destroying its many ex-
Iuisite qualities. Perhaps when jap
snese artists absorb it's spirit instead
If merely trying to initiate its methods,
western art may help in the direction
'f freedom; Mt present fear that its
influence has done more harm than
rood. The people are so quick to orecog.
aize the meaning of a few lines, and to
the poetic idea which they
suggest, that it Is wonder the artists
,ver learned to draw ct all; they might
lave been content with symbols. for a
ew lines are enough to convey all the
,oetry that is associated in their minds
With any of the well-known art mo-
ives.