Part 11

While we are content with a scale divided into semitones, the more delicate oriental ear requires _quarter_ tones. The Arab octave is divided into _twenty-four_ intervals. A distinguished musician on a visit to Cairo wrote Helmholtz as follows: “This evening I have listened attentively to the song on the minarets, to try to appreciate the _quarter-tones_ which I had not supposed to exist, as I had thought the Arabs sang _out of tune_. But today as I was with the dervishes I became certain that such quarter-tones existed.[56]

In discussing the development of our modern, _equal_ temperament (adopted commercially in England for pianos not until 1846), Helmholtz says, “Amiot reports equal temperament from China long previously even to Pythagoras.”[57]

The Chinese are the only people who, thousands of years ago, possessed a system of octaves, a circle of fifths, and a normal tone. With this knowledge, however, their eighty-four scales, _each of which has a special philosophical signification_, appear all the more incomprehensible to us.[58]

“The Chinese believe their music to be the first in the world. _European music_ they consider to be _barbaric_ and _horrible_.”[59]

* * * * *

All this goes to show how hazardous it is to jump to the conclusion that what we don’t understand has no meaning.

To one ignorant of Chinese or Japanese or Hebrew handwriting it seems just as absurd and meaningless as a drawing by Picasso or a painting by Kandinsky, but to the earnest

and indefatigable searcher after hidden meanings the strange handwriting and the strange pictures both deliver up a message.

* * * * *

Of such paintings as Kandinsky’s improvisations it is often flippantly said, “They paint that way because they can’t draw.”

As a matter of fact most of the extreme moderns such as Picasso, Matisse, Kandinsky, are past-masters of the art of drawing.

But they do not now attach the importance to drawing, merely for the sake of drawing, they once did.

Kandinsky’s own attitude is expressed in the following extract from a letter:

As regards other artists, I am very tolerant, but at the same time most severe; my opinion of artists is influenced but little by considerations of the element of form, pure and simple; I expect of the artist to bear within at least the “sacred spark” (if not “flame”). There really is nothing easier than to master the form of something or someone. Boecklin is quoted as having said that even a poodle-dog might learn how to draw, and in this he was correct. At the schools I attended I had more than a hundred colleagues who had learned something, many had in good time managed to draw quite well and anatomically correct--_still_, they were not artists, not a pfennig’s worth. In short, I value _only_ those artists who really are artists; that is, who consciously or unconsciously, in an _entirely original form_, or in a style bearing their _personal imprint_, embody the expression of their _inner self_; who, consciously or unconsciously, work _only_ for _this end_ and cannot work _otherwise_. The number of such artists is very few. If I were a collector I would buy the works of such even if there were weaknesses in what they did; _such_ weaknesses grow less in time and finally disappear entirely, and though they may be apparent in the earlier works of the artist still they do not deprive even these earlier and less perfect works of value. But the _other_ weakness, that of _lack of soul_, never decreases with time, but is sure to grow worse and become more and more apparent, and so render absolutely valueless works that _technically_ may be very correct. The entire history of art is proof of this. The _union_ of _both_ kinds of strength--that of intellect or spirituality with that of form, or technical perfection--is most rare, as is also demonstrated by the history of art.

* * * * *

From his exceedingly abstruse article “On the Question of Form” in “Der Blaue Reiter,” I take and paraphrase the following:

At certain times our inner forces--impulses--mature and the result is a longing to create something, and we try to find a material form--manifestation--for the _new value_ that exists in us in spiritual or intellectual form.

This is the seeking of the _spiritual_ for material expression. Matter is but the store house out of which the spirit selects the necessary elements to secure the objective result.

Thus the _creative spirit_ is hidden in the matter, behind the material manifestation through which it must make itself known. But often the material envelope is so dense that only a few people can discern the spiritual idea within and behind it; some people never penetrate behind the matter at all, and therefore, never comprehend the spiritual message.

While many comprehend the _spiritual_ content behind the _outward_ forms of religion, they do not realize that there is, or should be, a _spiritual_ content behind the _outward_ forms of art.

There are whole epochs when men seem blind to the spiritual truths that are behind material manifestations; generally speaking, the nineteenth century was a century of _materialism_.

It is as if a _black hand_ were placed over the eyes of men so they should not see the spiritual forces behind the material, and the production of new spiritual values is fought by mockery and calumny. The man who produces the new value is held up to ridicule and called a charlatan.

The _joy of living_ is the _perpetual victory_ of the new, the _spiritual value_. But even as men learn to appreciate the new of yesterday and today they establish it as a barrier against the new of tomorrow. Spiritual development and evolution are a constant throwing down of these bars that are as constantly re-erected by the materialism and blindness of mankind.

Therefore the important thing is not only the impulse to create new spiritual values, but _liberty_ to do so.

The spiritual is the _absolute_, the outward form is _relative_, it is born of the place and the hour. Therefore one should not fall into the worship of a particular form, but should use whatever form best serves to express the spiritual content.

And, naturally, each artist must use _his own form_ to express his own ideas, and _form_ should have the stamp of _personality_.

Each nation, each epoch will develop its own forms, or peculiarities of forms, and it is the reflection of the nation, the epoch, the individual in the particular form that is known as, or makes the _style_.

When a group of artists is animated by the same spirit the forms they use will be so alike the result will be a “movement” or “school” in art; but a “school” should not be permitted to dominate the freedom of others. Every individual must be at liberty to choose the form that best expresses the spiritual message he wishes to utter.

The form--picture--may be agreeable or disagreeable, beautiful or ugly, harmonious or disharmonious, but it must not be judged on its outward appearance; it must be judged by the _idea_, the _spiritual value_ behind it. We must look _through_ the form to the spiritual, as we would look through the deformed body of the cripple to the soul of the man.

In practical life we never meet a man who, if he wishes

to go to Berlin, gets off the train at Regensberg. But in spiritual life it is a common thing to find people who step out at Regensberg. Sometimes the engine driver refuses to go on and all the travelers have to leave the train at Regensberg. How many who are _looking for God_ stop before a _carved image_! How many who are looking for art are caught by some form that has been used by some great artist to express _his_ ideas!

And in conclusion he asserts, it is not of vital importance whether the _form_ is personal, national, according to prevailing mode, or whether it is related to “schools,” “movements,” etc., etc., or is isolated. “_The important question is whether the form has grown out of the inner, spiritual necessity._”

* * * * *

In art, especially in painting, we have today striking richness of form which shows the immense striving that is going on.

To adhere stubbornly to one form is to travel a lane that has no outlet.

Many call the present state of painting “anarchy,” and so they say of music, but this appearance of anarchy, of lawlessness, is due to the workings of spiritual forces that cannot be expressed in old forms, but demand new manifestations.

It is one thing to reproduce on canvas an accurate representation of an object, but such a representation is no more than the outer shell; to find out whether the picture has any real, any spiritual value one must get rid of this outer shell. Step by step the “objective,” the photographic elements are eliminated until in the end there may be no trace of any object, and with this elimination the spiritual content becomes plainer and plainer. The steps are:

Realism--abstraction--

Abstraction--_reality_.

* * * * *

Objects need not necessarily be eliminated from a picture, but they should be used _not_ for the sake of forcing their photographic likenesses upon the observer, but solely to more perfectly express the inner, the spiritual significance of the work.

If a painter introduces a suggestion of a landscape or a bit of still life it should be for the purpose of making _his_ meaning, _his_ inner feeling plainer to the beholder, and not for the purpose of making a colored photograph of a field or flowers.

Therefore it does not matter whether _actual_ or _abstract_ forms are used by the artist, so long as both are used to express _spiritual values_. The sole question regarding form the artist should put to himself is, “Which form, or combination of forms, shall I use in this case to express most fully and plainly my spiritual mood?”

* * * * *

The _ideal art critic_ is not the critic who tries to discover mistakes, ignorance, imitations in the form, but he who tries to _feel_ and _understand_ how the form _expresses_ the _inner feeling_ of the artist and who tries to make the public understand.

A painter may use new and strange forms for the sake of the forms, just for the sake of painting new and strange pictures, but the result will be lifeless.

It is only when new and strange forms are used _because_ they are necessary to express a spiritual content that the result is a _living_ work of art.

“_The world reverberates; it is a cosmos of spiritually working human beings. Thus matter is living spirit._”

* * * * *

Rather a fine philosophy, is it not?

One cannot but feel that out of such thoughts good works must come.

* * * * *

To quote once more from a personal letter:

“I have now been exhibiting for almost fifteen years, and for the same fifteen years I have been hearing (although more rarely of late) that I have gone too far on my way; that in time my exaggerations will most surely decrease, and that I would yet paint in an ‘entirely different manner'; that I would ‘return to nature.’ I had to hear this for the first time when I exhibited my studies painted on the naturalist basis with the horn (spatula).

“The truth of the matter is that every really gifted artist, that is, an artist working under an impulse _from within_, must go in a way that in some mystical manner has been laid out for him from the very start. His life is nothing but the fulfillment of a task set for him (_for him, not by himself_). Meeting with enmity from the start, he feels only vaguely and indistinctly that he carries a message for the expression of which he must find a _certain_ manner. This is the period of ‘storm and stress,’ then follow desperate _searching_, pain, great pain--until _finally_ his eyes open and he says to himself, ‘There is my way.’ The rest of his life lies along this path. And one must follow it to the very last hour _whether one wants to do so, or not_. And no one must imagine that this is a Sunday afternoon’s walk, for which one selects the route at will. Neither is there any Sunday about it; it is a working day, in the strongest sense possible. And the greater the artist, the more one-sided is he in _his_ work; true, he retains the ability to do ‘nice’ work of other kind (by reason of his ‘talent'), but _innerly_ weighty, infinitely deep, and immeasurable serious things he can achieve _only_ in his _one-sided_ art. Talent is not an electric pocket lantern, the rays of which one may at will direct now hither and then thither; it is a star for which the path is being prescribed by the dear Lord.

“As far as I am concerned personally, I was as if thunderstruck, when for the first time and in only a general manner I began to see my way. I was awed. I deemed this inspiration to be a delusion, a ‘temptation.’

“You will easily understand what doubts I had to overcome, until I became convinced that I had to follow this way. Of course, I clearly understood what it means ‘to drop the objective.’ With what doubts I was troubled regarding my own powers! For I knew at once _what_ powers were _absolutely_ required for this task. How this inner development proceeded, how _everything_ pushed me on to this way and how the exterior development slowly but logically (step by step) followed suit, you will see from my book that is to appear shortly (in English). All that I still see _ahead_ of me, all these tasks, the ever-increasing wealth of possibilities, the ever-growing depth of painting I cannot describe. And one must and _may_ not describe such things: they must mature _innerly_ in secret confinement and may not be expressed otherwise than by the painter’s art.

“If in time you acquire the ability to more exactly _live_ my pictures, you will have to admit that the element of ‘chance’ is very rarely met with in these pictures, and that it is more than amply covered by the large positive sides--so amply, indeed, that it is not worth while to mention those weak spots.

“My constructive forms, although outwardly appearing indistinct, are in fact rigidly fixed as if they were cut in stone.

“These explanations lead us too far; they could help only if illustrated by examples. Also, this letter is already much longer than it ought to be. I trust that I have expressed myself clearly! These things are so infinitely complicated,

and how often do I deviate from my theme and thus (instead of producing ‘clarity') cause confusion to become worse confounded!”

* * * * *

The result are paintings such as the four reproduced in color and half-tone.

The brilliant color combinations and harmonies of the originals are inadequately disclosed in the reproductions, the scale is too reduced. But the forms are well indicated, strange, curious forms, meaningless on first impression but _insistent_.

Most people are repelled at once by the landscapes because they seem so badly drawn a child could do better; but even as landscapes, as impressions of nature--or rather of _something in nature_--the pictures will not be denied.

If they were intended to be accurate representations of natural scenes, mountains, fields, trees, houses, they would be ridiculous indeed, but they are not so intended, therefore they should not be so judged.

In looking at these pictures--compositions, rather, it is but fair to look at them from the point of view of the painter, try to _read_ them as he _wrote_ them.

* * * * *

“_Compositional_” painting is no radical departure, no new discovery.

The instinct of the child is to “compose,” to create. It is only after much chiding and correction that the child draws literally--copies what it _sees_.

* * * * *

It takes a big and strong man to pass through schools and academies and come out unscathed. The art school is a godsend to talent and mediocrity; it is a menace to genius.

Most paintings are “compositional” to _some_ extent. But from the literalness of Monet’s hay stacks to the abstract qualities of Kandinsky’s improvisations the interval is great.

There is, too, a difference in kind, as well as degree, between the compositions of the painter who simply re-arranges nature, persons, or objects to secure a pleasing or effective result, and the painter who uses nature, life, or objects as so many signs or notes to express his inner feelings; the former paints to _impress_ others, the latter paints to _express himself_ to others. The one is thinking all the time of his picture, the other is thinking all the time of his message.

All great painters have combined the two attitudes, they have _expressed themselves_ in pictures that not only convey the message but _as pictures_ impress others--that is characteristic of the world’s great art.

At the moment the pendulum is swinging toward the extreme where everything is subordinated to the expression of the artist’s _self_, and the indications are that some subtle and wonderful things will be painted before the pendulum swings back.

* * * * *

To what extent the public generally will accept pure compositional painting it is impossible to say; but the number of those who enjoy it will steadily increase until there will be many lovers of art who will collect only the most abstract works.

* * * * *

A Russian painter of great strength but entirely different inspiration and technic was asked, “Do you like Kandinsky’s Improvisations?”

“Very much.”

“Do you understand them?”

“No.”

“Then why do you like them?”

“Because they give me pleasure and I am sure that as I look at them they excite in me the same pleasure they excited in him when he painted them; he has succeeded in conveying to me his own emotions and that is the most any artist can hope to do.”

Which brings us back to the proposition laid down in an earlier chapter: the emotional reaction to music and painting may be and usually is quite independent of the intellectual, and while it may be either increased or diminished in _volume_ by _understanding_, it is necessarily _changed_ in character.

* * * * *

Another artist, an Austrian, was asked:

“How do you like Kandinsky’s Improvisations?”

After a moment’s hesitation he replied slowly: “They interest me immensely, and I admire the man’s courage to express himself in his own way regardless whether people understand him or not, but he goes so far that it is almost impossible for even his friends and sympathizers to understand his pictures. He goes so far he is quite alone, no one can follow, and therein I think perhaps he makes a mistake, for after all pictures should be so painted that those who earnestly try can understand them.”

But that is just the question that every great artist is obliged to put to himself, “Shall I write or paint so that others will understand, or shall I express myself in my own way even though no one but myself comprehends and even I fail at times?”

It is just as bad to paint with the sole purpose of being understood--_commercialism_--as it is to paint with the sole purpose of being misunderstood--_charlatanism_.

VIII

COLOR MUSIC

Color music is no new idea, but of late it is finding new expression.

While painters are beginning to paint color harmonies that are independent of the representations of natural objects, others are seeking the same emotional effects with colored lights.

A “color organ” has been invented[60] which deals with color for its own sake as music does with sound, thereby opening up a new world of beauty and interest as yet to a great extent unexplored.

When you enter Mr. Rimington’s English studio you see at one end of it a curious instrument with a keyboard and stops, while at the other end is a white screen, hung in folds to give greater depth and life to the colors playing upon it. What happens when the instrument is played is thus described by Mr. Rimington:

“Imagine a darkened concert room. At one end there is a large screen of white drapery in folds, surrounded with black and framed by two bands of pure white light. Upon this we will suppose, as an example of a simple color composition, that there appears the faintest possible flush of rose color, which very gradually fades away while we are enjoying its purity and subtlety of tint, and we return to darkness. Then, with an interval, it is repeated in three successive phases, the last of which is stronger and more prolonged.

“While it is still lingering upon the screen, a rapid series of touches of pale lavender notes of color begin to flit across it, gradually strengthening into deep violet. This again becomes shot with amethyst, and afterward changing gradually into a broken tint of ruby, gives a return to the warmer tones of the opening passage.

“A delicate primrose now appears, and with little runs and flushes of pulsation leads through several passages of indescribable cinnamon

color to deep topaz. Then suddenly interweavings of strange green and peacock blue, with now and then a touch of pure white, make us seem to feel the tremulousness of the Mediterranean on a breezy day, and as the color deepens there are harmonies of violet and blue green which recall its waves under a Tramontana sky. More and more powerful they grow, and the eye revels in the depth and magnificence of the color as the executant strikes chord after chord among the bass notes of the instrument.

“Then suddenly the screen is again dark and there is only a rhythmic and echoing beat of the dying color upon it. At last this disappears also, and there is another silent pause, then one hesitating tint of faded rose as at the opening of the composition.

“Upon this follows a stronger return of the color, and as the screen once more begins to glow with note after note of red and scarlet, we are prepared for the rapid crescendo which finally leads up to a series of staccato and forte chords of pure crimson which almost startle us with the force of their color before they die away into blackness!

“This,” says Mr. Rimington, “is an extremely simple example, but it may suffice to show the kind of effect produced by an unadorned form of mobile color not accompanied by music. In some cases a musical accompaniment was found to add greatly to the interest of a color composition. The nearest approach to color music in nature is to be found in certain sunsets.” Of the emotional and aesthetic effect of color music on various beholders we read:

The amount of pleasure and interest derived from color compositions varies immensely with individuals. An interesting instance of this was the case of a well-known London doctor, who told the author, after first seeing a recital of color-music, that he was absolutely unappreciative of any form of “sound music;” that it was, in fact, a pain to him, and that he had always detested it. “But,” he said, “from the moment that I first saw a display of mobile color, I realized what I had missed all my life through my inability to appreciate music. It opened up a new world of sensations to me and gave me the greatest mental pleasure I have ever experienced.” This clearly shows that to some persons mobile color would, or does, fill the place which music can not occupy in their lives.