DOI issue:
No. 202 (January, 1910)
DOI article:Folliott Stokes, A. G.: Julius Olsson, painter of seascapes
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.20968#0302
Julius
Olsson
the Sciences, must of necessity be few and far
between, and in advance of their age. They are
consequently misunderstood. Even the most in-
telligent of us are swathed in platitudes and custom
as securely as a mummy in cloth. It is given to
but a small minority to think independently of
convention, and to bring an unbiased mind to the
contemplation of any new thing. Such and such
a thing must be so, because it always has been so,
is the formula, or rather parrot cry, with which
all independent thought is met. Remember how
Rodin's new visions were ridiculed for many years,
even in artistic France. Even Darwin's brother
scientists, who ought to have known better, scoffed at
his " Origin of Species," which now forms one of the
stoutest pillars in the citadel of acquired knowledge.
And so in painting. There was a time, not very long
ago, when there were those who scoffed because
Julius Olsson saw in waves and their foaming crests
all the colours of the opal: because he gave to those
creaming gulfs of " cruel crawling foam" that
divide one Atlantic roller from another shades of
exquisite violet, and the complementary chords of
those brilliant primary colours that glow on the broad
cheeks of the great cumulus clouds which some-
times tower like Alps toward the zenith, and which
the rising or setting sun incarnadines. Many of
the critics, whose knowledge of the sea was in
some cases limited to a glimpse of it from the end
of a Brighton pier, or through the window of a
Brighton hotel, shrieked loud and shrill. They
know better now. They have learned that, while
foam may be all the colours of the rainbow, it is
rarely, if ever, white. White, as far as colour goes,
is a negative condition, which, when it belongs to
a transparent or crystalline substance, such as foam
or snow, is extremely sensitive to and ready to
assume the colours of surrounding objects, when
contact is direct. When it is interrupted, or, in
other words, when foam and snow are in shadow,
they assume, as I have already pointed out, the
complementary tones of the brilliant hues with which
the sun paints the heavens. Thus it is that a great
sea painter is, or could be if he chose, a great
snow painter. To him, the silent peaks of Darien
will reveal their secrets as readily as the rolling
:MOONRISE ON THE BAR" BY JULIUS OLSSON
280
Olsson
the Sciences, must of necessity be few and far
between, and in advance of their age. They are
consequently misunderstood. Even the most in-
telligent of us are swathed in platitudes and custom
as securely as a mummy in cloth. It is given to
but a small minority to think independently of
convention, and to bring an unbiased mind to the
contemplation of any new thing. Such and such
a thing must be so, because it always has been so,
is the formula, or rather parrot cry, with which
all independent thought is met. Remember how
Rodin's new visions were ridiculed for many years,
even in artistic France. Even Darwin's brother
scientists, who ought to have known better, scoffed at
his " Origin of Species," which now forms one of the
stoutest pillars in the citadel of acquired knowledge.
And so in painting. There was a time, not very long
ago, when there were those who scoffed because
Julius Olsson saw in waves and their foaming crests
all the colours of the opal: because he gave to those
creaming gulfs of " cruel crawling foam" that
divide one Atlantic roller from another shades of
exquisite violet, and the complementary chords of
those brilliant primary colours that glow on the broad
cheeks of the great cumulus clouds which some-
times tower like Alps toward the zenith, and which
the rising or setting sun incarnadines. Many of
the critics, whose knowledge of the sea was in
some cases limited to a glimpse of it from the end
of a Brighton pier, or through the window of a
Brighton hotel, shrieked loud and shrill. They
know better now. They have learned that, while
foam may be all the colours of the rainbow, it is
rarely, if ever, white. White, as far as colour goes,
is a negative condition, which, when it belongs to
a transparent or crystalline substance, such as foam
or snow, is extremely sensitive to and ready to
assume the colours of surrounding objects, when
contact is direct. When it is interrupted, or, in
other words, when foam and snow are in shadow,
they assume, as I have already pointed out, the
complementary tones of the brilliant hues with which
the sun paints the heavens. Thus it is that a great
sea painter is, or could be if he chose, a great
snow painter. To him, the silent peaks of Darien
will reveal their secrets as readily as the rolling
:MOONRISE ON THE BAR" BY JULIUS OLSSON
280