DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.1399#0119
PLATE 238.
PAPER-HANGINGS,
BY KNEPPEE & SCHMIDT, VIENNA.
IN the accompanying illustration we have an example of that judicious conventionality which
must form the basis of all good design in surface-decoration. It is but a few years since
when the student was directed to go to Nature and reproduce her as ornament, pur et simple.
As a guiding principle, this was discovered, in a short time, to be practically impracticable; and a
conventional treatment of natural subjects is now almost universally recognized as the most artistic
and reasonable. We shall proceed to quote several authorities on this subject.
Owen Jones,—than whom no one has done more in this country to place decorative art on
right principles, and extend its influence, thus writes in the " Journal of Design," concerning
decoration amongst the Asiatics :—" The guiding principle of their admirable ornamentation appears
to be that their decoration was always what may be called surface-decoration. Their general
guiding forms were first considered, and these forms decorated. Their flowers are not natural
flowers, but conventionalized by the material in which they worked. We do not see, as in
European works, a highly-wrought imitation of a natural flower, with its light and shade struggling
to stand out from the ground on which it is worked; but a conventional representation sufficiently
near to suggest an image to the mind, without destroying the unity of the object it is intended to
decorate: there is a total absence of shadow. In their diapers and scroll-work, one of the means
whereby their harmonizing effect is produced appears to be that the ornament and the ground
occupy equal areas : to obtain this requires no ordinary skill, and can only be arrived at by highly-
trained hands and minds. In their conventional foliage, in all cases, we find the forms flowing out
from a parent stem; the space which has to be filled, however varied in form, being accomplished
with the most exquisite skill. We never see here ornaments dotted down, as in modern works,
the existence of which cannot be accounted for. Every flower, however distant, can be traced
to its branch and root."
Mr. Wyatt, in his " Lecture on the Principles which should determine Form in the Decorative
Arts " (1852), observes that " all decoration the forms of which are borrowed from nature, to be
pleasing, must undergo a process of conventionalizing. The exact amount of resemblance which
the hieroglyphic may be permitted to bear to that object, some ideal property of which it is
intended to express, must depend upon so great a variety of circumstances, that it obviously
becomes one of the most delicate operations of the artist's skill to adjust the precise form in which
he shall work out his ornament. The treatment of the honeysuckle by the Greeks, and the lotus
by the Egyptians, are probably the happiest existing illustrations of refined appreciation of the
mysteries of judicious conventionalizing."
Mr. Redgrave, R.A., in his " Report on Design " (1851 Exhibition), speaking of paper-hangings,
observes that " imitative treatments are objectionable on principle, both as intruding on the sense
of flatness, and as being too attractive in their details and colour to be sufficiently retiring and
unobtrusive;" and again, in his "Report on Paper-hangings" (Paris Exhibition, 1855), "The
patterns of paper-hangings should be subdued and proportioned to the size of the rooms; the colour
should be rather negative than positive; tending to tints or shades rather than to full hues; and
should be so equally distributed as to avoid violent contrasts; which rule will apply to the forms also :
these should be treated fiat, and not in imitative relief. These rules are necessary to be observed
to render the walls a background, and subordinate them to the objects in the room, whether it be
the furniture, the art, or the occupants themselves. In addition to this, there requires such a
variety, both for colour and pattern, as will admit of a suitable choice for aspect or for situation,
so as to carry out, or to be in harmony with, the other furniture. These conditions observed,
the ornament may consist either of abstract forms or of floral adaptations."
Dr. Dresser, in his " Art of Decorative Design " (1862), considers that " not only is a flat
treatment the only treatment which is adapted to a flat surface, as a wall, but there are special
effects which are peculiarly suited to particular rooms."
Mr. Wornum, in his excellent work " The Analysis of Ornament " (1856), says, " Natural floral
ornament is one kind of ornament, and a very beautiful kind ; but even an infinite variety of floral
detail, especially in the round, will have assthetically but very little variety of effect upon the mind.
For this purpose, we must bring Art to the aid of Nature, or work upon the principles illustrated
by natural objects rather than imitate their individual appearances."
PAPER-HANGINGS,
BY KNEPPEE & SCHMIDT, VIENNA.
IN the accompanying illustration we have an example of that judicious conventionality which
must form the basis of all good design in surface-decoration. It is but a few years since
when the student was directed to go to Nature and reproduce her as ornament, pur et simple.
As a guiding principle, this was discovered, in a short time, to be practically impracticable; and a
conventional treatment of natural subjects is now almost universally recognized as the most artistic
and reasonable. We shall proceed to quote several authorities on this subject.
Owen Jones,—than whom no one has done more in this country to place decorative art on
right principles, and extend its influence, thus writes in the " Journal of Design," concerning
decoration amongst the Asiatics :—" The guiding principle of their admirable ornamentation appears
to be that their decoration was always what may be called surface-decoration. Their general
guiding forms were first considered, and these forms decorated. Their flowers are not natural
flowers, but conventionalized by the material in which they worked. We do not see, as in
European works, a highly-wrought imitation of a natural flower, with its light and shade struggling
to stand out from the ground on which it is worked; but a conventional representation sufficiently
near to suggest an image to the mind, without destroying the unity of the object it is intended to
decorate: there is a total absence of shadow. In their diapers and scroll-work, one of the means
whereby their harmonizing effect is produced appears to be that the ornament and the ground
occupy equal areas : to obtain this requires no ordinary skill, and can only be arrived at by highly-
trained hands and minds. In their conventional foliage, in all cases, we find the forms flowing out
from a parent stem; the space which has to be filled, however varied in form, being accomplished
with the most exquisite skill. We never see here ornaments dotted down, as in modern works,
the existence of which cannot be accounted for. Every flower, however distant, can be traced
to its branch and root."
Mr. Wyatt, in his " Lecture on the Principles which should determine Form in the Decorative
Arts " (1852), observes that " all decoration the forms of which are borrowed from nature, to be
pleasing, must undergo a process of conventionalizing. The exact amount of resemblance which
the hieroglyphic may be permitted to bear to that object, some ideal property of which it is
intended to express, must depend upon so great a variety of circumstances, that it obviously
becomes one of the most delicate operations of the artist's skill to adjust the precise form in which
he shall work out his ornament. The treatment of the honeysuckle by the Greeks, and the lotus
by the Egyptians, are probably the happiest existing illustrations of refined appreciation of the
mysteries of judicious conventionalizing."
Mr. Redgrave, R.A., in his " Report on Design " (1851 Exhibition), speaking of paper-hangings,
observes that " imitative treatments are objectionable on principle, both as intruding on the sense
of flatness, and as being too attractive in their details and colour to be sufficiently retiring and
unobtrusive;" and again, in his "Report on Paper-hangings" (Paris Exhibition, 1855), "The
patterns of paper-hangings should be subdued and proportioned to the size of the rooms; the colour
should be rather negative than positive; tending to tints or shades rather than to full hues; and
should be so equally distributed as to avoid violent contrasts; which rule will apply to the forms also :
these should be treated fiat, and not in imitative relief. These rules are necessary to be observed
to render the walls a background, and subordinate them to the objects in the room, whether it be
the furniture, the art, or the occupants themselves. In addition to this, there requires such a
variety, both for colour and pattern, as will admit of a suitable choice for aspect or for situation,
so as to carry out, or to be in harmony with, the other furniture. These conditions observed,
the ornament may consist either of abstract forms or of floral adaptations."
Dr. Dresser, in his " Art of Decorative Design " (1862), considers that " not only is a flat
treatment the only treatment which is adapted to a flat surface, as a wall, but there are special
effects which are peculiarly suited to particular rooms."
Mr. Wornum, in his excellent work " The Analysis of Ornament " (1856), says, " Natural floral
ornament is one kind of ornament, and a very beautiful kind ; but even an infinite variety of floral
detail, especially in the round, will have assthetically but very little variety of effect upon the mind.
For this purpose, we must bring Art to the aid of Nature, or work upon the principles illustrated
by natural objects rather than imitate their individual appearances."