The Sauk Centre herald. (Sauk Centre, Stearns County, Minn.) 1886-current, 1903-06-25
THE CITY OF COLOR.
NEW YORK a PICTURE or PLEASING
CONTRASTS IN HuEs.

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The Anerican Metropolis In This
Respect Surpasses All the Great
Monotone Tinted Capitals Of the
Occidental World.
New York has been written about
from almost every possible point of
~ow-architectural, commercial, polit-
real and social. Yet SO far as we know
it has never been properly appreciated
for the one thing in which it surpasses
| all the other great capitals of the occi-
dental world, and that is for its color.
Those of us who live here all our lives
| or who absent ourselves for only brief
and inconsiderable periods Of time
never know how extraordinary Is the
| environment in which we have been
placed 1t is only the stranger with an
| artistic sense or the native who has
been long away who gets the full eff
| feet of this city of ours in its unique
prismatic foridity Of hue such as vivi-
fies no other city Of it's kind.
If you will think for moment and
visualize from memory the great cities
of Europe as colorist would see them
you will be struck by the fact that each
one is a monotone. London has the
dull. dingy, smoky hue of its own No
vember fogs, and as you pass along its
| miles and miles of streets, weller of
| unvariegated facades and homely chin
ney pots, your impression will be
more and more that London is one
great smudge, hideous and unrelieved
beneath a sky of watery paleness
which merely accentuates little more
the dingy hue Of everything beneath it.
Paris equally represents monotone, a
delicate gray that is neat and clean and
| that adds to the symmetry and har-
moniousness Of the whole effect, but
| that is seldom diversified by warmer
tones. Berlin is a monotone in buff,
| and, Rome, like Paris. for the most
part, a monotone in gray.
One thinks at first of Naples as a
! city brilliant with the hues of the
| south, but little reflection will show
| that it is not the city itself which can
be rightly so regarded, but rather the
setting of the city as one perceives it
from the ship on which he enters the
glorious bay or from the Capo di Posi-
| lipo. The intense blue of the sky, the
emerald of the surrounding hills, the
sparkle on the waters that lap its
crescent shore, the huge dun slope of
Vesuvius, with it's golden smoke, and
Capri in the distance swimming in
golden mist-these things afford an IN
forgettable dream of perfect coloring.
But Naples itself! The place is as
commonplace and dirty and depress-
ing as Constantinople, which also from
distance cheats you into thinking it
| colorist's paradise.
| 1t is New York alone which, after
delighting the eye, with the beauty Of
its harbor, embraced by the long
slopes Of billowy green, fascinates the
eye by the brilliancy and diversity of
it's color scheme. The sky is as blue
as that which is arched above the
Mediterranean. Its sunshine Is as
! bright, and it is sifted down upon the
city like gold dust scattered by a Law
ish hand. But the sky and the sun
light merely intensity the vividness OF
| the color contrasts which are visible
at every turn. Here is no convention,
no conformity, no desire for harmo-
| NOUS effect. The snowy whiteness Of
| marble and the clean gray of granite
are everywhere intermingled with the
cheerful buff or the warm, rich reds
of brick. Patches Of green appear at
the end of every vista.
The enormous display windows of
the shops are riot Of blues and vel
lows and pale rose and heliotrope and
scarlet. Gliding catches and reflects
the sunlight at every turn. Flags and
streamers and multicolored awnings
add to the effect, so that every street
| is a veritable spectrum. Throughout
the whole length and breadth of the
island city color abounds in 1ecks and
| splashes. 1t is just a bit barbaric,
possibly, but it is also wonderful and
striking.
To the sober dullness of Madrid or
Rome or London it is what the Pom
peiian wall paintings are to the quiet
canvases Of Harpignies7not art, but
| instinct nevertheless with sensuous-
ness and a glow that stir one strange
~. If you are a native of New York
perhaps you never noticed this. Yet
| all the same it is set before you every
| day, and if you will only think of 1t
the next time you go out of doors you
will perceive it as revelation and
| will know that whatever else New
York may be it is,-at any rate, a color
| city, and as such it is one that has no
rival.-New York Commercial Adver-
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