"Pictorial Composition And the Critical Judgment of Pictures: A Handbook for Students and Lowers of Art" Book Scanning
Book Scanning :Pictorial Composition And the Critical Judgment of Pictures: A Handbook for Students and Lowers of ArtBy H. R. POORE, A.N.A.Book Publishing Company :Published by The Baker & Taylor Co.Download Now
____________________________________________________________________________________
CONTENTS :
PAST I PICTORIAL COMPOSITION
I. INTRODUCTORY
II. THE SCIENTIFIC SENSE IN PICTURES
III. BALANCE
Balance of the Steelyard
Postulates
Vertical and Horizontal Balance
The Natural Axis
Apparent or Formal Balance
Balance by Opposition of Line
Balance by Opposition of Spots
Transition of Line
Balance by Gradation
Balance of Principality or Isolation
Balance of Cubical Space
IV. EVOLVING THE PICTURE
V. ENTRANCE AND EXIT
Getting into the Picture
Getting out of the Picture
VI. THE CIRCULAR OBSERVATION OF PICTURES
Circular Composition
Reconstruction for Circular Observation
VII. ANGULAR COMPOSITION, THE LINE OF BEAUTY AND THE RECTANGLE
The Vertical Line in Angular Composition
Angular Composition Based on the Horizontal
The Line of Beauty
The Rectangle
VIII. THE COMPOSITION OF ONE, Two, THREE, AND MORE UNITS
The Figure in Landscape
IX. GROUPS
X. LIGHT AND SHADE
Principality by Emphasis, Sacrifice, and Contrast
Gradation
XI THE PLACE OF PHOTOGRAPHY IN FINE ART
PART II THE AESTHETICS OF COMPOSITION
XII. BREADTH VERSUS DETAIL
Suggestiveness
Mystery
Simplicity
Keserve
Belief
Finish
PART III THE CRITICAL JUDGMENT OF PICTURES
XIII. THE MAN IN ART
XIV. SPECIFIC QUALITIES AND FAULTS
XV. THE PICTURE SENSE
XVI. COLOR, HARMONY, TONE
Values
XVII. ENVELOPMENT AND COLOR PERSPECTIVE
XVIII. THE BIAS OF JUDGMENT
XIX. THE LIVING PRINCIPLE
APPENDIX
INDEX
____________________________________________________________________________________
SAMPLE CONTENT :
THIS book has been prepared because, although the student
has been abundantly supplied with aids to decorative art, there is little, within his reach, concerning pictorial composition.
I have added thereto hints on the critical judgment of pictures with the hope of simplifying to the many the means of knowing pictures, prompted by the recollection of the topsyturviness of this question as it confronted my own mind a score of years ago. I was then apt to strain at a Corot hoping to discover in the employment of some unusual color or method the secret of its worth, and to think of the old masters as a different order of beings from the rest of mankind.
Let me trust that, to a degree at least, these pages may prove iconoclastic, shattering the images created of superstitious reverence and allowing, in their stead, the artist to be substituted as something quite as worthy of this same homage.
The author acknowledges the courtesies of the publishers of Scribners, The Century and Munaey's magazines, D. Appleton, Manzi, Joyant & Co., and of the artists giving consent to the use of their pictures for this book. Acknowledgment is also made to F. A. Beardsley, H. K. Freeman and L. Lord, for sketches contributed thereto.
HENRY RANKIN POORE,
Orange, N. J.t Feb.I, 1903
_____________________________
INTRODUCTORY
THIS volume is addressed to three classes of readers ; to the layman, to the amateur photographer, and to the professional artist. To the latter it speaks more in the temper of the studio discussion than in the spirit didactic. But, emboldened by the friendliness the profession always exhibits toward any serious word in art, the writer is moved to believe that the matters herein discussed may be found worthy of the artist's attention perhaps of his question. For that reason the tone here and there is argumentative.
The question of balance has never been reduced to a theory or stated as a set of principles which could be sustained by anything more than example, which, as a working basis must require reconstruction with every change of subject. Other forms of construction have been sifted down in a search for the governing principle, a substitution for the " rule and example."
To the student and the amateur, therefore, it must be said this is not a "how-to-do" book. The number of these is legion, especially in painting, known to all students, wherein the matter is didactic and usually set forth with little or no argument. Such volumes are published because of the great demand and are demanded because the student, in his haste, will not stop for principles, and think it out. He will have a rule for each case ; and when his direct question has been answered with a principle, he still inquires,"Well, what shall I do here ?"
Why preach the golden rule of harmony as an abstraction, when inharmony is the concrete sin to be destroyed. We reach the former by elimination. Whatever commandments this book contains, therefore, are the shalt nots.
As the problems to the maker of pictures by photography are the same as those of the painter and the especial ambition of the former's art is to be painter-like, separations have been thought unnecessary in the address of the text. It is the best wish of the author that photography, following painting in her essential principles as she does, may prove herself a well met companion along art's highway, seekers together, at arm's length, and in defined limits, of the same goal.
The mention of artists' names has been limited, and a liberal allusion to many works avoided because to multiply them is both confusing and unnecessary.
To the art lover this book may be found of interest as containing the reasons in picture composition, and through them an aid to critical judgment. We adapt our education from quaint and curious sources. It is the apt correlation of the arts which accounts for the acknowledgment by an English story writer that she got her style from Kuskins' "Principles of Drawing"; and of a landscape painter that to sculpture he owed his discernment of the forest secrets, by daily observing the long lines of statues in the corridor of the Koyal Academy ; or by the composer of pictures to the composer of music ; or by the preacher that suggestions to discourse had come to him through the pictorial processes of the painter.
Book Scanning :
Pictorial Composition And the Critical Judgment of Pictures: A Handbook for Students and Lowers of Art
By H. R. POORE, A.N.A.
Book Publishing Company :
Published by The Baker & Taylor Co.
Download Now
____________________________________________________________________________________
CONTENTS :
PAST I PICTORIAL COMPOSITION
I. INTRODUCTORY
II. THE SCIENTIFIC SENSE IN PICTURES
III. BALANCE
Balance of the Steelyard
Postulates
Vertical and Horizontal Balance
The Natural Axis
Apparent or Formal Balance
Balance by Opposition of Line
Balance by Opposition of Spots
Transition of Line
Balance by Gradation
Balance of Principality or Isolation
Balance of Cubical Space
IV. EVOLVING THE PICTURE
V. ENTRANCE AND EXIT
Getting into the Picture
Getting out of the Picture
VI. THE CIRCULAR OBSERVATION OF PICTURES
Circular Composition
Reconstruction for Circular Observation
VII. ANGULAR COMPOSITION, THE LINE OF BEAUTY AND THE RECTANGLE
The Vertical Line in Angular Composition
Angular Composition Based on the Horizontal
The Line of Beauty
The Rectangle
VIII. THE COMPOSITION OF ONE, Two, THREE, AND MORE UNITS
The Figure in Landscape
IX. GROUPS
X. LIGHT AND SHADE
Principality by Emphasis, Sacrifice, and Contrast
Gradation
XI THE PLACE OF PHOTOGRAPHY IN FINE ART
PART II THE AESTHETICS OF COMPOSITION
XII. BREADTH VERSUS DETAIL
Suggestiveness
Mystery
Simplicity
Keserve
Belief
Finish
PART III THE CRITICAL JUDGMENT OF PICTURES
XIII. THE MAN IN ART
XIV. SPECIFIC QUALITIES AND FAULTS
XV. THE PICTURE SENSE
XVI. COLOR, HARMONY, TONE
Values
XVII. ENVELOPMENT AND COLOR PERSPECTIVE
XVIII. THE BIAS OF JUDGMENT
XIX. THE LIVING PRINCIPLE
APPENDIX
INDEX
____________________________________________________________________________________
SAMPLE CONTENT :
THIS book has been prepared because, although the student
has been abundantly supplied with aids to decorative art, there is little, within his reach, concerning pictorial composition.
I have added thereto hints on the critical judgment of pictures with the hope of simplifying to the many the means of knowing pictures, prompted by the recollection of the topsyturviness of this question as it confronted my own mind a score of years ago. I was then apt to strain at a Corot hoping to discover in the employment of some unusual color or method the secret of its worth, and to think of the old masters as a different order of beings from the rest of mankind.
Let me trust that, to a degree at least, these pages may prove iconoclastic, shattering the images created of superstitious reverence and allowing, in their stead, the artist to be substituted as something quite as worthy of this same homage.
The author acknowledges the courtesies of the publishers of Scribners, The Century and Munaey's magazines, D. Appleton, Manzi, Joyant & Co., and of the artists giving consent to the use of their pictures for this book. Acknowledgment is also made to F. A. Beardsley, H. K. Freeman and L. Lord, for sketches contributed thereto.
HENRY RANKIN POORE,
Orange, N. J.t Feb.I, 1903
_____________________________
INTRODUCTORY
THIS volume is addressed to three classes of readers ; to the layman, to the amateur photographer, and to the professional artist. To the latter it speaks more in the temper of the studio discussion than in the spirit didactic. But, emboldened by the friendliness the profession always exhibits toward any serious word in art, the writer is moved to believe that the matters herein discussed may be found worthy of the artist's attention perhaps of his question. For that reason the tone here and there is argumentative.
The question of balance has never been reduced to a theory or stated as a set of principles which could be sustained by anything more than example, which, as a working basis must require reconstruction with every change of subject. Other forms of construction have been sifted down in a search for the governing principle, a substitution for the " rule and example."
To the student and the amateur, therefore, it must be said this is not a "how-to-do" book. The number of these is legion, especially in painting, known to all students, wherein the matter is didactic and usually set forth with little or no argument. Such volumes are published because of the great demand and are demanded because the student, in his haste, will not stop for principles, and think it out. He will have a rule for each case ; and when his direct question has been answered with a principle, he still inquires,"Well, what shall I do here ?"
Why preach the golden rule of harmony as an abstraction, when inharmony is the concrete sin to be destroyed. We reach the former by elimination. Whatever commandments this book contains, therefore, are the shalt nots.
As the problems to the maker of pictures by photography are the same as those of the painter and the especial ambition of the former's art is to be painter-like, separations have been thought unnecessary in the address of the text. It is the best wish of the author that photography, following painting in her essential principles as she does, may prove herself a well met companion along art's highway, seekers together, at arm's length, and in defined limits, of the same goal.
The mention of artists' names has been limited, and a liberal allusion to many works avoided because to multiply them is both confusing and unnecessary.
To the art lover this book may be found of interest as containing the reasons in picture composition, and through them an aid to critical judgment. We adapt our education from quaint and curious sources. It is the apt correlation of the arts which accounts for the acknowledgment by an English story writer that she got her style from Kuskins' "Principles of Drawing"; and of a landscape painter that to sculpture he owed his discernment of the forest secrets, by daily observing the long lines of statues in the corridor of the Koyal Academy ; or by the composer of pictures to the composer of music ; or by the preacher that suggestions to discourse had come to him through the pictorial processes of the painter.
