As to the origin of Syntheticism we have divergent statements from contemporary witnesses. The English artist, A.S. Hartrick, who was studying in Paris from 1886 to 1889 and who knew personally both Gauguin and Van Gogh, ascribes the Synthetic theory to Gauguin in these terms:-- "From a study of thirteenth century glass he (Gauguin) got an idea of design and color which exactly suited his state of development, and he then proceeded to translate it into an art of his own, using oil paint as a vehicle."[1] Of similar opinion is the well known French artist and writer, Maurice Denis, whose work has done so much to popularise Gauguin. He declares in his book "Theories,"[2] that Gauguin was the "incontestable originator" and master of the new movement, to which he gives two names: Neo-Traditionism and Symbolism. In the first account which he wrote of the movement in 1890, an account obtained from the lips of Paul Sérusier, one of the earliest of Gauguin's disciples after 1889, Denis includes the following interesting paragraph: "Did not Paul Gauguin originate this ingenious and unpublished history of modeling? "At the beginning there was the pure arabesque, as little deceptive of the eye as possible; a wall is empty; cover it with symmetrical spots of form, harmonious in color:--stained glass, Egyptian pictures, Byzantine mosaics. "From this comes the painted bas-relief:--metopes of the Greek temple, the church of the Middle Ages. "Then the attempt to attain to the ornamental deception of the eye practised in Antiquity is resumed in the fifteenth century by the Italian primitives, who replace the painted bas-relief by paintings modeled to imitate bas-relief, but in other respects preserve the first idea of decorative unity. Recall also under what conditions Michaelangelo, a sculptor, decorated the Sistine ceiling. "Perfection of this modeling; modeling in high-relief. This leads from the first academy of the Caracchi to our decadence." Emile Bernard holds a contrary opinion. His view was originally published in the _Mercure de France_ and reasserted in his preface to the letters written to him by Van Gogh.[3] Bernard, who revolted from the Atelier Cormon with Anquetin, had, as we have seen, been repulsed by Gauguin in in 1886. After a brief return to Paris he went off to Saint-Briac, where he covered the walls of the inn with frescoes and painted the windows, in imitation of stained-glass, employing essence of turpentine as a medium. In 1888, before Gauguin came to Arles, Bernard was brought into contact with him again through the mediation of Theodore Van Gogh and, although young enough to be Gauguin's son (being about twenty at this time), shared with him the honors of the Volpini exhibition.