By the greatest men this kind of sketch is hardly ever made; they
conceive their subjects distinctly at once, and their sketch is not to
try them, but to fasten them down. Raphael's form the only important
exception--and the numerous examples of experimental work by him are
evidence of his composition being technical rather than imaginative. I
have never seen a drawing of the kind by any great Venetian. Among the
nineteen thousand sketches by Turner--which I arranged in the National
Gallery--there was, to the best of my recollection, _not one_. In
several instances the work, after being carried forward a certain
length, had been abandoned and begun again with another view; sometimes
also two or more modes of treatment had been set side by side with a
view to choice. But there were always two distinct imaginations
contending for realization--not experimental modifications of one.
§ 5. II. _Determinant._--The fastening down of an idea in the simplest
terms, in order that it may not be disturbed or confused by after work.
Nearly all the great composers do this, methodically, before beginning a
painting. Such sketches are usually in a high degree resolute and
compressive; the best of them outlined or marked calmly with the pen,
and deliberately washed with color, indicating the places of the
principal lights.
Fine drawings of this class never show any hurry or confusion. They are
the expression of concluded operations of mind, are drawn slowly, and
are not so much sketches, as maps.
§ 6. III. _Commemorative._--Containing records of facts which the master
required. These in their most elaborate form are "studies," or drawings,
from Nature, of parts needed in the composition, often highly finished
in the part which is to be introduced. In this form, however, they never
occur by the greatest imaginative masters. For by a truly great inventor
everything is invented; no atom of the work is unmodified by his mind;
and no study from nature, however beautiful, could be introduced by him
into his design without change; it would not fit with the rest. Finished
studies for introduction are therefore chiefly by Leonardo and Raphael,
both technical designers rather than imaginative ones.
Commemorative sketches, by great masters, are generally hasty, merely to
put them in mind of motives of invention, or they are shorthand
memoranda of things with which they do not care to trouble their memory;
or, finally, accurate notes of things which they must _not_ modify by
invention, as local detail, costume, and such like. You may find
perfectly accurate drawings of coats of arms, portions of dresses,
pieces of architecture, and so on, by all the great men; but you will
not find elaborate studies of bits of their pictures.
[Illustration: FIG. 97.]
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