V. Art Appreciation

V. Art Appreciation

Have you heard the Taoist tale of the Taming of the Harp?

Once in the hoary ages in the Ravine of Lungmen stood a

Kiri tree, a veritable king of the forest. It reared its head to

talk to the stars; its roots struck deep into the earth,

mingling their bronzed coils with those of the silver

dragon that slept beneath. And it came to pass that a

mighty wizard made of this tree a wondrous harp, whose

stubborn spirit should be tamed but by the greatest of

musicians. For long the instrument was treasured by the

Emperor of China, but all in vain were the efforts of those

who in turn tried to draw melody from its strings. In

response to their utmost strivings there came from the harp

but harsh notes of disdain, ill-according with the songs they

fain would sing. The harp refused to recognise a master.

At last came Peiwoh, the prince of harpists. With tender

hand he caressed the harp as one might seek to soothe an

unruly horse, and softly touched the chords. He sang of

nature and the seasons, of high mountains and flowing waters,

and all the memories of the tree awoke! Once more the sweet

breath of spring played amidst its branches. The young

cataracts, as they danced down the ravine, laughed to the

budding flowers. Anon were heard the dreamy voices of

summer with its myriad insects, the gentle pattering of rain,

the wail of the cuckoo. Hark! a tiger roars,--the valley

answers again. It is autumn; in the desert night, sharp like

a sword gleams the moon upon the frosted grass. Now

winter reigns, and through the snow-filled air swirl flocks

of swans and rattling hailstones beat upon the boughs with

fierce delight.

Then Peiwoh changed the key and sang of love. The forest

swayed like an ardent swain deep lost in thought. On high,

like a haughty maiden, swept a cloud bright and fair; but

passing, trailed long shadows on the ground, black like

despair. Again the mode was changed; Peiwoh sang of

war, of clashing steel and trampling steeds. And in the

harp arose the tempest of Lungmen, the dragon rode the

lightning, the thundering avalanche crashed through the

hills. In ecstasy the Celestial monarch asked Peiwoh wherein

lay the secret of his victory. "Sire," he replied, "others have

failed because they sang but of themselves. I left the harp to

choose its theme, and knew not truly whether the harp had

been Peiwoh or Peiwoh were the harp."

This story well illustrates the mystery of art appreciation.

The masterpiece is a symphony played upon our finest

feelings. True art is Peiwoh, and we the harp of Lungmen.

At the magic touch of the beautiful the secret chords of

our being are awakened, we vibrate and thrill in response

to its call. Mind speaks to mind. We listen to the unspoken,

we gaze upon the unseen. The master calls forth notes we

know not of. Memories long forgotten all come back to us

with a new significance. Hopes stifled by fear, yearnings

that we dare not recognise, stand forth in new glory. Our

mind is the canvas on which the artists lay their colour; their

pigments are our emotions; their chiaroscuro the light of joy,

the shadow of sadness. The masterpiece is of ourselves, as

we are of the masterpiece.

The sympathetic communion of minds necessary for art

appreciation must be based on mutual concession. The

spectator must cultivate the proper attitude for receiving

the message, as the artist must know how to impart it. The

tea-master, Kobori-Enshiu, himself a daimyo, has left to us

these memorable words: "Approach a great painting as thou

wouldst approach a great prince." In order to understand a

masterpiece, you must lay yourself low before it and await

with bated breath its least utterance. An eminent Sung critic

once made a charming confession. Said he: "In my young

days I praised the master whose pictures I liked, but as my

judgement matured I praised myself for liking what the masters

had chosen to have me like." It is to be deplored that so few of

us really take pains to study the moods of the masters. In our

stubborn ignorance we refuse to render them this simple

courtesy, and thus often miss the rich repast of beauty spread

before our very eyes. A master has always something to offer,

while we go hungry solely because of our own lack of

appreciation.

To the sympathetic a masterpiece becomes a living reality

towards which we feel drawn in bonds of comradeship. The

masters are immortal, for their loves and fears live in us over

and over again. It is rather the soul than the hand, the man than

the technique, which appeals to us,--the more human the call

the deeper is our response. It is because of this secret

understanding between the master and ourselves that in poetry

or romance we suffer and rejoice with the hero and heroine.

Chikamatsu, our Japanese Shakespeare, has laid down as one of

the first principles of dramatic composition the importance

of taking the audience into the confidence of the author.

Several of his pupils submitted plays for his approval, but

only one of the pieces appealed to him. It was a play

somewhat resembling the Comedy of Errors, in which

twin brethren suffer through mistaken identity. "This," said

Chikamatsu, "has the proper spirit of the drama, for it

takes the audience into consideration. The public is permitted

to know more than the actors. It knows where the mistake

lies, and pities the poor figures on the board who innocently

rush to their fate."

The great masters both of the East and the West never forgot

the value of suggestion as a means for taking the spectator into

their confidence. Who can contemplate a masterpiece without

being awed by the immense vista of thought presented to our

consideration? How familiar and sympathetic are they all;

how cold in contrast the modern commonplaces! In the former

we feel the warm outpouring of a man's heart; in the latter

only a formal salute. Engrossed in his technique, the

modern rarely rises above himself. Like the musicians who

vainly invoked the Lungmen harp, he sings only of himself.

His works may be nearer science, but are further from

humanity. We have an old saying in Japan that a woman

cannot love a man who is truly vain, for their is no crevice

in his heart for love to enter and fill up. In art vanity is equally

fatal to sympathetic feeling, whether on the part of the artist

or the public.

Nothing is more hallowing than the union of kindred spirits in

art. At the moment of meeting, the art lover transcends himself.

At once he is and is not. He catches a glimpse of Infinity, but

words cannot voice his delight, for the eye has no tongue.

Freed from the fetters of matter, his spirit moves in the rhythm

of things. It is thus that art becomes akin to religion and

ennobles mankind. It is this which makes a masterpiece

something sacred. In the old days the veneration in which the

Japanese held the work of the great artist was intense. The

tea-masters guarded their treasures with religious secrecy,

and it was often necessary to open a whole series of boxes,

one within another, before reaching the shrine itself--the silken

wrapping within whose soft folds lay the holy of holies. Rarely

was the object exposed to view, and then only to the initiated.

At the time when Teaism was in the ascendency the Taiko's

generals would be better satisfied with the present of a

rare work of art than a large grant of territory as a reward

of victory. Many of our favourite dramas are based on the

loss and recovery of a noted masterpiece. For instance,

in one play the palace of Lord Hosokawa, in which was

preserved the celebrated painting of Dharuma by Sesson,

suddenly takes fire through the negligence of the samurai

in charge. Resolved at all hazards to rescue the precious

painting, he rushes into the burning building and seizes the

kakemono, only to find all means of exit cut off by the flames.

Thinking only of the picture, he slashes open his body with

his sword, wraps his torn sleeve about the Sesson and

plunges it into the gaping wound. The fire is at last

extinguished. Among the smoking embers is found a half-

consumed corpse, within which reposes the treasure uninjured

by the fire. Horrible as such tales are, they illustrate the great

value that we set upon a masterpiece, as well as the devotion

of a trusted samurai.

We must remember, however, that art is of value only to the

extent that it speaks to us. It might be a universal language

if we ourselves were universal in our sympathies. Our

finite nature, the power of tradition and conventionality, as

well as our hereditary instincts, restrict the scope of our

capacity for artistic enjoyment. Our very individuality

establishes in one sense a limit to our understanding; and our

aesthetic personality seeks its own affinities in the creations of

the past. It is true that with cultivation our sense of art

appreciation broadens, and we become able to enjoy many

hitherto unrecognised expressions of beauty. But, after all, we

see only our own image in the universe,--our particular

idiosyncracies dictate the mode of our perceptions. The tea-

masters collected only objects which fell strictly within the

measure of their individual appreciation.

One is reminded in this connection of a story concerning

Kobori-Enshiu. Enshiu was complimented by his disciples

on the admirable taste he had displayed in the choice of his

collection. Said they, "Each piece is such that no one could

help admiring. It shows that you had better taste than had

Rikiu, for his collection could only be appreciated by one

beholder in a thousand." Sorrowfully Enshiu replied: "This

only proves how commonplace I am. The great Rikiu dared

to love only those objects which personally appealed to him,

whereas I unconsciously cater to the taste of the majority.

Verily, Rikiu was one in a thousand among tea-masters."

It is much to be regretted that so much of the apparent

enthusiasm for art at the present day has no foundation in

real feeling. In this democratic age of ours men clamour

for what is popularly considered the best, regardless of their

feelings. They want the costly, not the refined; the fashionable,

not the beautiful. To the masses, contemplation of illustrated

periodicals, the worthy product of their own industrialism,

would give more digestible food for artistic enjoyment than

the early Italians or the Ashikaga masters, whom they pretend

to admire. The name of the artist is more important to them

than the quality of the work. As a Chinese critic complained

many centuries ago, "People criticise a picture by their ear."

It is this lack of genuine appreciation that is responsible for

the pseudo-classic horrors that to-day greet us wherever we

turn.

Another common mistake is that of confusing art with

archaeology. The veneration born of antiquity is one of the

best traits in the human character, and fain would we have

it cultivated to a greater extent. The old masters are rightly

to be honoured for opening the path to future enlightenment.

The mere fact that they have passed unscathed through

centuries of criticism and come down to us still covered

with glory commands our respect. But we should be foolish

indeed if we valued their achievement simply on the score of

age. Yet we allow our historical sympathy to override our

aesthetic discrimination. We offer flowers of approbation when

the artist is safely laid in his grave. The nineteenth century,

pregnant with the theory of evolution, has moreover created

in us the habit of losing sight of the individual in the species.

A collector is anxious to acquire specimens to illustrate a period

or a school, and forgets that a single masterpiece can teach us

more than any number of the mediocre products of a given

period or school. We classify too much and enjoy too little.

The sacrifice of the aesthetic to the so-called scientific method

of exhibition has been the bane of many museums.

The claims of contemporary art cannot be ignored in any

vital scheme of life. The art of to-day is that which really

belongs to us: it is our own reflection. In condemning it we

but condemn ourselves. We say that the present age possesses

no art:--who is responsible for this? It is indeed a shame that

despite all our rhapsodies about the ancients we pay so little

attention to our own possibilities. Struggling artists, weary

souls lingering in the shadow of cold disdain! In our self-

centered century, what inspiration do we offer them? The

past may well look with pity at the poverty of our civilisation;

the future will laugh at the barrenness of our art. We are

destroying the beautiful in life. Would that some great wizard

might from the stem of society shape a mighty harp whose

strings would resound to the touch of genius.