The Portland daily press., 1897-01-21
Thoughts on the working God and thu
Sewer, by Charles L. Fox.
To the Editor of the Press:


Sewer, by Charles L. Fox.
To the Editor of the Press:
Will you kindly grant me little space
in which to answer some of the ING uiries
concerning the "Working God and the
Sower''
see nothing unspiritual, irreverent
orr unnatural in paintings this subject as
it has been treated.
God is the creator. The class OF men who
create are themselves nearest to the
Great Creator.
The working class create more than the
leisure class. / have therefore painted
God as working man like mos of his
human. children.
The leading characteristic of the work
ing class is strength. / have therefore
painted God in strength as the EFather Of
eternal energy rather THAN the God of
eternalsrepose.
II l paint the hand worker rather than
the brain worker, 1t is simply because
those who work with their hands are ton
otter despised by those who work with
spised God, He who performs the great
unacknowledged labor of the world, is
the power that should be more often
painted and more often preached.
And if l should paint the brain worker,
I should also first paint him with the
qualities that endure the longest.
Strength endures longer than any other
Quality Strength carries simplicity,
directness an 1nefsiveness. Ths spirit
ual language of strength is different
from the. spiritual language OF the other
qualities.
The expressions of the strong face are
different from the expressions of other
faces; but these strong expressions are
not loss spiritual.
1t is not irreverent to paint God; nor
even daring to paint Him.
Do we not hear some of Gods attri-
butes discussed daily in the pulpit 1t is
the exclusive literary sense which Is
shocked when God enters the domain OF
art; or moro truly when art opens its
eyes to the divinity of it's mission.
Neither is 1t unnatural to paint God as
nearer and more real than the workman.
God In more man fest to the spiritual
eye than any man. more universally v1sl-
BILE in the rocks. plants and animals. Is
it not we'll to paint him nearer and more
real than any one part of his creation,
egen than man himself?
Moreover God is fitness of color as we'll
as delicaey of color, and to paint God in
siren 9Th would require strong color.
In this people there is a sreatz-weakness
of the color sense. white" they say
sis purity In truth there is no
"white," only the coarssness of our
vision enables US to say this; the yellow.
the red and the blue are each as pure"
as white. Indeed as far as we know ftsis
not until thesst white light dies that life
"Pale color is spiritual. color" says this
people, and the vistas of heaven that open
to them are far off, coIorless and pale.
Not SO. Heaven is here and the rose
and the lily nre in 1t. Has the glory OF
the rose no greater glory; no future with
the paler plants?
May Ifwrite one more, word on creative
art'' and "good and bad drawing" In
creative art the principles ARE very
different from these employed in Ereoord-
Ing art. To the artist who records good
drawing means exacs adherence to the
form OF the model to him bad drawing
means any deviation from the N odel.
In creative art, good drawing means
strict adherence to the spirit on its own
natural lines of development. In creative
art had dra ing means the hiding of the
spirit by the form; it. is the imperfect
adaptation of the sound to the sense.
CHARLES L. FOX.