In another room I ran across a teacher who was indicating by a few geometrical lines drawn from points the essential features of a statue the pupil was about to begin blocking in. The lines looked exactly like the geometrical lines in a drawing by Picasso. There is, therefore, nothing fundamentally new or strange in the technic of the Cubists; it is simply a return to the use of the elemental in drawing, of the very A, B, C of design. The new and the strange lie in the fact that the Cubists _stop_ with planes and lines; they do not attempt to model the surfaces of the things they paint. * * * * * Not that the use of planes is all there is to the theory of Cubism, for the theory extends far beyond the painting of surfaces; it embraces the presentation of the very _substance_ and nature of persons and objects by means of a _technic_ in which planes are the vital feature. * * * * * Albert Dürer wrote a book on the proportions of the human figure; it was published in 1528, and translated into many languages. He reduced the human figure to certain elemental lines.[37] [Illustration] Applying these principles to the hand, he gets this result: [Illustration] It is interesting to compare this sectional diagram of the hand with the hand of “The Man on the Balcony.” Furthermore, one has but to consider the elemental lines at the top of the page with the words of Cézanne, quoted on page 43, and with the fundamental propositions of Chinese and Japanese art, to realize that in the last analysis the [Illustration: PICASSO Woman with Mandolin] [Illustration: PICASSO The Poet] minds of men in all ages and all countries follow very closely the same channels. There are but _two_ lines, _curved_ and _straight_, and with these two lines all outward semblances of things are constructed. So far as the unaided eye is concerned, every curved line may be entirely composed of small straight lines, the curved effect being due to a series of minute angles. The following are Durer’s diagrams showing how to obtain sections and modifications: [Illustration] He applies these sections to the human figure as follows: [Illustration] [Illustration] So far as the use of planes and angles is concerned, these diagrams by Durer should serve to disarm criticism. That the human figure can be decomposed into straight lines and angles will be a revelation to most of those who laughed at the Cubist paintings, and only the authority of a great name would convince that any good could result from such an analysis. Suppose any one of the Durer diagrams had been framed and hung in the Cubist section; would it not have been treated with ridicule? The men who arranged the exhibition could have played with critics and artists--the men who claim to know--by including many things of recognized position in academic art and teachings, which would have seemed as absurd as the newest of the new pictures.