International studio (43.1911)

^he
INTERNATIONAL
■ STUDIO
VOL. XLIII. No. 171 Copyright, 1911, by John Lane Company MAY, 1911

EH. BLASHFIELD’S mural DEC-
ORATIONS FOR HUDSON
COUNTY AND YOUNGSTOWN
• COURT HOUSES
BY WILLIAM WALTON
In his eight great pendentives recently placed
under the central domes of two new and impos-
ing court house buildings, Mr. Blashfield seems
to have especially justified his choice of that field of
mural painting in which he has excelled, and which,
very possibly, was selected for him by temperament,
training and those various other circumstances and
qualities which distinguish one painter from an-
other. Whatever, architecturally considered, may
justify in certain conditions other styles of mural
painting, the gravely historic, the wildly decorative
and allegoric, the merely illustrative, that which
prides itself on being of the present day, literal, so-
called realistic, ignorantly scorning the imaginative
and the ideal—whatever may permit in certain archi-
tectural situations the introduction of some one of
these methods, it would seem that in the penden-
tives or spandrels, under a great open dome, only
one style of mural figure decoration in color was
called for. In these narrow triangular spaces, be-
tween the arches which carry the soaring dome, is
need only of something which completes the sense
of impersonal elevation and lightness and aspiration
and joy to the eye which the architect with his semi-
classic or near-Renaissance inspiration is trying to
express. In these narrow and most vital spaces
anything which interfered with this serene and tri-
umphal whole, which imparted information con-
cerning the iron workers and the masons, or the life
in the streets outside, or even some details of the
local history—in hunting shirts or in frock coats—
would be most incongruous. Here, if anywhere,
must the mural painter most strictly consider his
architecture, and, if he be really qualified, it may be
given him to complete finally the architect’s triumph
as no architect since Bramante could have done.

At least, something like this will be suggested to
the intelligent visitor who sees for the first time Mr.
Blashfield’s four pendentives of the trumpeter
Fames under the central dome of the big new Hud-
son County Court House on the heights of Jersey
City, N. J. To begin with, his paintings present an
admirable triumph of whites—that color which is so
difficult; in the midst of the colder and bluer and
grayer whites of the marbles around and below
them and under the purple and dull gold of the
dome above, these warmer, yellowish and greenish
whites, with the brown of the wings and the still
warmer tints of the flesh and the hair, give a curi-
ously beautiful color effect to the whole interior of
the upper part of the great open hall. The figures
seem luminous, even in the presence of the numer-
ous electric globes which burn on the brightest
days, and their stature and grace and wide wings
complete the impression of something monumental,
fine and imperishable, like the architecture. The
displayed wings are very important in this case—
which fact alone justifies the choice of this ideal and
imaginative art. In the second floor of this central
hall, below them, is a great circular opening sur-
rounded by a balustrade, so that the paintings can
be seen from the ground floor through this opening,
but much better from the second floor. A mezza-
nine balcony with a light iron railing is carried
around the four sides between the second and third
floors, and the walls, at this writing, show flat tints of
pale reds and oranges, but no other paintings. The
interior of the dome is decorated with narrow, verti-
cal, converging panels, with a background of dark-
purple similar to that which the painter has put in
behind his figures; on this background is a delicate
Renaissance pattern in dull yellow or dull gold, and
the necessary accent of red is furnished by little
oblong and circular medallions running around near
the center of the dome and bearing the signs of the
zodiac in white relief. The daylight falls through a
great circular skylight in the top, and is supplement-
ed by the numerous electric globes around the sides.

LIII