II. Mass 11 Being an ordinary mortal

Being an ordinary mortal, my curiosity, my telescopic eyes, my magnifying-glass of vision, my love of truth, my positive conviction that it is a spruce and should not be painted as a pine, except through rank perjury, all these forces together have undermined my impression or, like thorns, have grown up and choked it. Being honest, I am ready to confess that before returning to the spot I was in doubt about the pine. But I am still ready to affirm that what I have labored over is the exact counterfeit and presentment of nature, and equally willing to denounce the public for not seeing it as I do. I forget that I have been a boor and a vulgarian—that I have been invited to a feast and that I have pried into mysteries which my goddess would veil from my sight; that I have had the impertinence to bring my own personal advice into the discussion; that I have insisted that fissures, and leaves, and sand, and infinite detail were necessary to this expression of nature's sublimity. paintings for sale
Is it at all strange that the impression which so charmed me as I saw it from my car-window has faded? Nature unrolled for me suddenly a poem. For symbols she used a great mass of dark, sturdy trees against a majestic cloud, a rugged cliff, and a straggling path. I have ignored them all and insisted that "truth was mighty and must prevail." I am a realist and "paint things as they are." Not so. I am an iconoclast and have broken my god and cannot put together the pieces. I have sacrificed a divine impression to a human realism. dafen oil painting village
Suppose, however, that the painter who had this glimpse of nature before entering the tunnel was no ordinary man, but a man of steadfast mind, of firm convictions, of a sure touch, with an absolute belief in nature, and so reverential that he dare not offer even a suggestion of his own. He has seen it; he has felt it; it has gone down deep into his memory and heart. The cloud, the cliff, the mass, the path—that is all. And it is enough. The annoyances of the day, the seductions of fresh impressions of newer subjects, the weakness of the flesh do not deter him. With a single aim, to the exclusion of all else, and with a direct simplicity, he records what he saw, and lo! we have a poem. Such a man was Courbet, Corot, Dupré.

But one would say: That may answer for landscape: what about the figure-painter? Let us counsel together. oil paintings of nature