DOI Heft:
No. 254 (June 1914)
DOI Artikel:The lay figure: on the cult of the ugly
DOI Seite / Zitierlink: https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.21210#0104
The Lay Figure
THE LAY FIGURE: ON THE
CULT OF THE UGLY.
" Do you think we are losing our sense of
beauty ? " asked the Art Critic. " There is an odd
fashion just now in art—a sort of perverse pursuit
of deformity—of morbid and exaggerated ugliness.
What does it really mean?"
" It means, I take it," replied the Young Painter,
" that artists are tired of namby-pamby prettiness,
and want something more interesting. They are
searching nowadays for strong, well-defined character
and for the real facts of life, and they are trying to
present them convincingly and without silly com-
promises."
" Surely all the facts of life are not unpleasantly
ugly and repulsive," returned the Critic. "Is it
not possible to select from them some that have
the elements of beauty ? "
" Oh, there must be no selection in modern art,"
laughed the Man with the Red Tie. " You take
the first thing that comes and you record it with all
possible fidelity just as it is—that is the creed of
the moment."
" But why should the first thing that comes be
always ugly and deformed ?" inquired the Critic.
" No, that argument will not do ; there is selection
in the art of to-day, and the artist's choice, made, as
it seems to me, quite deliberately, too often falls
upon the thing that is unpleasant and unworthy ot
the attention he gives to it."
" Nothing in nature is unworthy of the artist's
attention," broke in the Young Painter; " but
some things are obviously of much greater im-
portance, and claim more attention than others.
What an artist records is the particular fact that has
made most impression upon him and that he cannot
help selecting."
" And the ugly thing makes the most impression
upon him because it is so ugly," commented the
Man with the Red Tie. " Is that what you
mean ? "
" No, of course not," cried the Young Painter.
" What impresses him is the strength of the possible
subject, its power and virility ; and he tries to
realise it with all the force there is in it. Why
should he be afraid to represent it as it is, and why
should he water it down simply for the sake of
making it pretty ?"
" Why should he not be as much impressed by
the beauty of his subject as by its ugliness ?
inquired the Critic. " Why cannot he get the
force of it and yet be able to keep it from being
unpleasant ? "
84
" Because, I presume, a subject that has no
beauty in it must become more unpleasant the more
forcibly it is presented," suggested the Man with the
Red Tie. " Besides, it is much easier, you must
remember, to make a thing forcible if you take
simply the crude reality of it and evade the obliga-
tion to make it pleasing."
" You must not accuse modern artists of evading
their obligations," protested the Young Painter.
" All of them who count as men of distinction are
sincere students, striving earnestly to present life as
they see it."
" To present life as they see it! Well, that may be
true enough," said the Critic. " But it is the way they
see it that I find so objectionable. If you shut
your eyes to the beauty of life what can you get
with all your earnest striving, except its sordid,
squalid ugliness ? "
" You can get character," asserted the Young
Painter.
"Character!" cried the Critic. "Has beauty
no character? Is the beautiful thing necessarily
feeble and contemptible ? I say that by the morbid
cult of ugliness you miss your best opportunities
of studying and realising character, because you
look only at what is unpleasantly obvious and fail
to perceive the subtleties that give character its
charm."
" Well, suppose I do honestly prefer what is
obvious," sighed the Young Painter. " Does it
really matter ? "
" Great heavens! Of course it matters," ex-
claimed the Critic. " If you admit that you prefer
ugliness you confess that you are cursed with
morbid instincts that unfit you to be an artist at
all. The love of beauty is an essential in every
wholesome temperament. It is the civilised and
educated development of the natural selection
instinct; it is the one thing that keeps the mind
clean and the aesthetic sense from degenerating
into a kind of vicious imbecility. It was the
inspiring principle in all great art of the past; it is
the one source from which in the future will come
all art that will be worthy of serious attention. If
you are really lacking in it you must be classed
with the decadents who, as a result of over-civilisa-
tion, are suffering from a species of mental disease
and have ceased to be normal human beings.
Indeed, I would go so far as to say that to cultivate
an actual preference for ugliness is to commit an
outrage on nature."
" Is it as bad as all that ?" sneered the Young
Painter.
The Lay Figure.
THE LAY FIGURE: ON THE
CULT OF THE UGLY.
" Do you think we are losing our sense of
beauty ? " asked the Art Critic. " There is an odd
fashion just now in art—a sort of perverse pursuit
of deformity—of morbid and exaggerated ugliness.
What does it really mean?"
" It means, I take it," replied the Young Painter,
" that artists are tired of namby-pamby prettiness,
and want something more interesting. They are
searching nowadays for strong, well-defined character
and for the real facts of life, and they are trying to
present them convincingly and without silly com-
promises."
" Surely all the facts of life are not unpleasantly
ugly and repulsive," returned the Critic. "Is it
not possible to select from them some that have
the elements of beauty ? "
" Oh, there must be no selection in modern art,"
laughed the Man with the Red Tie. " You take
the first thing that comes and you record it with all
possible fidelity just as it is—that is the creed of
the moment."
" But why should the first thing that comes be
always ugly and deformed ?" inquired the Critic.
" No, that argument will not do ; there is selection
in the art of to-day, and the artist's choice, made, as
it seems to me, quite deliberately, too often falls
upon the thing that is unpleasant and unworthy ot
the attention he gives to it."
" Nothing in nature is unworthy of the artist's
attention," broke in the Young Painter; " but
some things are obviously of much greater im-
portance, and claim more attention than others.
What an artist records is the particular fact that has
made most impression upon him and that he cannot
help selecting."
" And the ugly thing makes the most impression
upon him because it is so ugly," commented the
Man with the Red Tie. " Is that what you
mean ? "
" No, of course not," cried the Young Painter.
" What impresses him is the strength of the possible
subject, its power and virility ; and he tries to
realise it with all the force there is in it. Why
should he be afraid to represent it as it is, and why
should he water it down simply for the sake of
making it pretty ?"
" Why should he not be as much impressed by
the beauty of his subject as by its ugliness ?
inquired the Critic. " Why cannot he get the
force of it and yet be able to keep it from being
unpleasant ? "
84
" Because, I presume, a subject that has no
beauty in it must become more unpleasant the more
forcibly it is presented," suggested the Man with the
Red Tie. " Besides, it is much easier, you must
remember, to make a thing forcible if you take
simply the crude reality of it and evade the obliga-
tion to make it pleasing."
" You must not accuse modern artists of evading
their obligations," protested the Young Painter.
" All of them who count as men of distinction are
sincere students, striving earnestly to present life as
they see it."
" To present life as they see it! Well, that may be
true enough," said the Critic. " But it is the way they
see it that I find so objectionable. If you shut
your eyes to the beauty of life what can you get
with all your earnest striving, except its sordid,
squalid ugliness ? "
" You can get character," asserted the Young
Painter.
"Character!" cried the Critic. "Has beauty
no character? Is the beautiful thing necessarily
feeble and contemptible ? I say that by the morbid
cult of ugliness you miss your best opportunities
of studying and realising character, because you
look only at what is unpleasantly obvious and fail
to perceive the subtleties that give character its
charm."
" Well, suppose I do honestly prefer what is
obvious," sighed the Young Painter. " Does it
really matter ? "
" Great heavens! Of course it matters," ex-
claimed the Critic. " If you admit that you prefer
ugliness you confess that you are cursed with
morbid instincts that unfit you to be an artist at
all. The love of beauty is an essential in every
wholesome temperament. It is the civilised and
educated development of the natural selection
instinct; it is the one thing that keeps the mind
clean and the aesthetic sense from degenerating
into a kind of vicious imbecility. It was the
inspiring principle in all great art of the past; it is
the one source from which in the future will come
all art that will be worthy of serious attention. If
you are really lacking in it you must be classed
with the decadents who, as a result of over-civilisa-
tion, are suffering from a species of mental disease
and have ceased to be normal human beings.
Indeed, I would go so far as to say that to cultivate
an actual preference for ugliness is to commit an
outrage on nature."
" Is it as bad as all that ?" sneered the Young
Painter.
The Lay Figure.