DOI Heft:
No.127 (October, 1903)
DOI Artikel:Soissons, S. C. de: The etchings of Camille Pissarro
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.19880#0079
The Etchings of Camille Pissarro
when Velasquez or Van Dyck chose for their
portraits the most favourable light for the purpose
of expressing life in human nature; when Rem-
brandt painted Christ's body with some phosphoric
light on the dark background, and by doing so
produced the impression of something mysterious ;
then, in every one of those three cases, we see an
intelligent use of light employed with a perfect
knowledge of its value.
When I say "knowledge," I do not mean that
those painters are forced to do so by theory and
logic; they are only sincere painters, endowed with
the real artistic temperament, men to whom the
light speaks, and who know how to use it, accord-
ing to their intuitions and not because of serious
thought over it. Such is the case with Camille
Pissarro, who is continually preoccupied with the
logical light of his paintings, viz., how to keep the
chosen motive of the light in all parts of his
picture. Pissarro knows how to produce light by
means of a colour, and he is capable of putting
the tones of the light in such relation as to
really make them fulfil the purpose intended.
Pissarro knows well that the art of painting
cannot produce the surface of light, and also
"L'lLE LACROIX A. ROUEN "
that, when a painter once introduces it he
must be logical and keep absolutely to the original
aim he had in view; he must use all possible
means in order to approach reality so far as
the means of the art of painting permit. All
the pictures painted by Pissarro prove that he
is aware of the logical error of disregarding
the purpose for which light is used. He watches
Nature carefully, he remembers all changes
that happen in the phenomena of light, which
depend on the time of day, on the weather,
on a mist hanging in the air, and on other
factors. While for the primitive painters the
trees were always green and water and sky
always blue, and the relations of these two
colours were based only on their relative intensity
and were inclining either towards a warm or a cold
tone, for Pissarro earth and heaven, water and
plant, animals and people, all shine with the
tints from which the local colour changes almost
entirely into another colour, exactly as it is in
nature. Pissarro never forgets how to harmonise
the supplementary colours according to the tone
of light used in the picture, nor how to balance
them. He harmonises the local colours in such a
BY CAMILLE PISSARRO
when Velasquez or Van Dyck chose for their
portraits the most favourable light for the purpose
of expressing life in human nature; when Rem-
brandt painted Christ's body with some phosphoric
light on the dark background, and by doing so
produced the impression of something mysterious ;
then, in every one of those three cases, we see an
intelligent use of light employed with a perfect
knowledge of its value.
When I say "knowledge," I do not mean that
those painters are forced to do so by theory and
logic; they are only sincere painters, endowed with
the real artistic temperament, men to whom the
light speaks, and who know how to use it, accord-
ing to their intuitions and not because of serious
thought over it. Such is the case with Camille
Pissarro, who is continually preoccupied with the
logical light of his paintings, viz., how to keep the
chosen motive of the light in all parts of his
picture. Pissarro knows how to produce light by
means of a colour, and he is capable of putting
the tones of the light in such relation as to
really make them fulfil the purpose intended.
Pissarro knows well that the art of painting
cannot produce the surface of light, and also
"L'lLE LACROIX A. ROUEN "
that, when a painter once introduces it he
must be logical and keep absolutely to the original
aim he had in view; he must use all possible
means in order to approach reality so far as
the means of the art of painting permit. All
the pictures painted by Pissarro prove that he
is aware of the logical error of disregarding
the purpose for which light is used. He watches
Nature carefully, he remembers all changes
that happen in the phenomena of light, which
depend on the time of day, on the weather,
on a mist hanging in the air, and on other
factors. While for the primitive painters the
trees were always green and water and sky
always blue, and the relations of these two
colours were based only on their relative intensity
and were inclining either towards a warm or a cold
tone, for Pissarro earth and heaven, water and
plant, animals and people, all shine with the
tints from which the local colour changes almost
entirely into another colour, exactly as it is in
nature. Pissarro never forgets how to harmonise
the supplementary colours according to the tone
of light used in the picture, nor how to balance
them. He harmonises the local colours in such a
BY CAMILLE PISSARRO