DOI Heft:
Nr. 44 (November 1896)
DOI Artikel:Logan, Mary: Hermann Obrist's embroidered decorations
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.17298#0117
Hermann Obrisfs Embroidered Decorations
imagine for a moment a single one of these lines seeing it; they are not like the miscellaneous bric-
carried a couple of inches further ! The vision a-brac which it is an infinitely greater pleasure to
would be torn from the comfortable space in which buy than to possess ; they are things to hang on our
a resting-place has been made for it, and would be walls, to lay on our floors, to cover our chairs and
turned adrift over the whole ground. Whenever it tables with, things which can never tyrannise and
tried to nestle back in comfort this disturbing line never become indifferent. The power and move-
would pull it out into the waste again. Or let us ment of the lines cannot but stimulate our relaxed
take the delicate little pattern of oat-heads, where energies in a thousand subtle ways, hidden from
a distinct impression of rounded space is conveyed our consciousness, and tone our nerves up to the
with no less speed and ease. Think of one of the point where fatigue passes over into rest; colour
APPLTQUE WORK, DESIGNED BY HERMANN OBRIST EXECUTED BY BERTHA RUCHET
two sharp leaves on the outside, or both ot them, such as this cannot help having its deep soothing
carried on upward. The same feelings of unrest, of effect; and such harmonious yet varied composition
dislocation and of uncertainty would follow. Picture must keep the attention from restless, vexed wander-
to one's self the leaf among the buoyant stems on ing. And they have an even further merit—they
the breakfast-table cover set an inch lower or an inch would not easily keep house with objects of inferior
higher. The poise of the whole plant, its grace of beauty ! Wherever they were introduced, they
spiral windings, would be instantly disturbed. It would tend to bring everything up to their own
would topple over, and lose its upward rhythm. level, so that instead of being surrounded, as most
of us are, by forms at the best indifferent (and to
But these embroideries are not things to admire sensitive people positively depressing), instead of
in galleries and talk about afterwards, they are seeing in our furnishings nothing but unsympathetic
things to live with. They do not, like most pic- shapes and dispiriting lines, the things our eyes
tures, tell us a story which only stops boring us, fell upon would soothe, caress, stimulate and
because, although it remains on our wall, we stop fortify our nerves. Mary Logan.
io5
imagine for a moment a single one of these lines seeing it; they are not like the miscellaneous bric-
carried a couple of inches further ! The vision a-brac which it is an infinitely greater pleasure to
would be torn from the comfortable space in which buy than to possess ; they are things to hang on our
a resting-place has been made for it, and would be walls, to lay on our floors, to cover our chairs and
turned adrift over the whole ground. Whenever it tables with, things which can never tyrannise and
tried to nestle back in comfort this disturbing line never become indifferent. The power and move-
would pull it out into the waste again. Or let us ment of the lines cannot but stimulate our relaxed
take the delicate little pattern of oat-heads, where energies in a thousand subtle ways, hidden from
a distinct impression of rounded space is conveyed our consciousness, and tone our nerves up to the
with no less speed and ease. Think of one of the point where fatigue passes over into rest; colour
APPLTQUE WORK, DESIGNED BY HERMANN OBRIST EXECUTED BY BERTHA RUCHET
two sharp leaves on the outside, or both ot them, such as this cannot help having its deep soothing
carried on upward. The same feelings of unrest, of effect; and such harmonious yet varied composition
dislocation and of uncertainty would follow. Picture must keep the attention from restless, vexed wander-
to one's self the leaf among the buoyant stems on ing. And they have an even further merit—they
the breakfast-table cover set an inch lower or an inch would not easily keep house with objects of inferior
higher. The poise of the whole plant, its grace of beauty ! Wherever they were introduced, they
spiral windings, would be instantly disturbed. It would tend to bring everything up to their own
would topple over, and lose its upward rhythm. level, so that instead of being surrounded, as most
of us are, by forms at the best indifferent (and to
But these embroideries are not things to admire sensitive people positively depressing), instead of
in galleries and talk about afterwards, they are seeing in our furnishings nothing but unsympathetic
things to live with. They do not, like most pic- shapes and dispiriting lines, the things our eyes
tures, tell us a story which only stops boring us, fell upon would soothe, caress, stimulate and
because, although it remains on our wall, we stop fortify our nerves. Mary Logan.
io5