The Use of a Box of Colours In a Practical Demonstration on Composition, Light and Shade, and Colour.   By: Harry Willson

PRACTICAL TREATISE

ON

COMPOSITION, LIGHT AND SHADE,

AND COLOUR.

PRINTED BY WILLIAM WILCOCKSON, ROLLS BUILDINGS, FETTER LANE.

[Illustration]

THE USE

OF A

BOX OF COLOURS,

IN A

Practical Demonstration on

COMPOSITION, LIGHT AND SHADE,

AND COLOUR.

Illustrated by Plain and Coloured Examples.

BY

HARRY WILLSON,

AUTHOR OF FUGITIVE SKETCHES IN ROME, VENICE, ETC.

LONDON: PUBLISHED BY TILT AND BOGUE, FLEET STREET, FOR THE PROPRIETOR, CHARLES SMITH, 34, MARYLEBONE STREET, PICCADILLY. M.DCCC.XLII.

Entered at Stationers' Hall.

PREFACE.

BETWEEN those works on Art which are too costly, or too old to be useful now, those, which are too comprehensive or prolix and those, which teach nothing, it was suggested to the Author, that an investigation and simple arrangement of the Principles on which he has hitherto successfully taught, with useful results, would form a Practical Treatise, calculated to abridge the labours and shorten the road of the Student, by its available suggestions.

CONTENTS.

Page

PREFATORY REMARKS; COMPOSITION, APPLIED TO PAINTING 1

OF ANGULAR COMPOSITION 9

OF THE CIRCULAR FORM IN COMPOSITION 12

LIGHT AND SHADE ITS APPLICATION TO PAINTING 15

ON COLOUR 30

OF THE THREE PRIMITIVE COLOURS 33

ON GENERAL NATURE 39

ON RULES 45

ON COPYING 47

ON THE LIGHT AND SHADE OF COLOUR; AND REFLEXES 52

HARMONY AND CONTRAST 61

EFFECT, ACCIDENT, RELIEF, AND KEEPING 63

DEXTERITY AND AFFECTATION 68

OF BACKGROUNDS 71

ON WATER COLOUR 73

OF TINTS 75

REFERENCE TO THE PLATES ON COLOUR 76

DESCRIPTION OF THE PLATES 78

COMPOSITION.

'GENIUS is the power of making efforts.'

Erroneous opinions, once formed, seldom fail to affect the taste of a man's character through his whole life. It is, therefore, of the utmost necessity that his conduct be rightly directed.

'Art will not descend to us, we must be made to reach and aspire to it.'

'The great art to learn much,' says Locke, 'is to undertake a little at a time.' And Dr. Johnson has very forcibly observed 'That all the performances of human art, at which we look with praise or wonder, are instances of the resistless force of perseverance : it is by this that the quarry becomes a pyramid, and that distant countries are united by canals. If a man were to compare the effect of a single stroke with a pickaxe, or of one impression of a spade, with the general design and last result, he would be overwhelmed with the sense of their disproportion; yet those petty operations, incessantly continued, in time surmount the greatest difficulties; and mountains are levelled, and oceans bounded, by the slender force of human beings.