File:History of art (1921) (14782947192).jpg

Identifier: historyofar02faur (find matches)
Title: History of art
Year: 1921 (1920s)
Authors: Faure, Elie, 1873-1937 Pach, Walter, 1883-1958
Subjects: Art
Publisher: New York and London : Harper & brothers
Contributing Library: PIMS - University of Toronto
Digitizing Sponsor: University of Toronto

View Book Page: Book Viewer
About This Book: Catalog Entry
View All Images: All Images From Book
Click here to view book online to see this illustration in context in a browseable online version of this book.

Text Appearing Before Image:
so he makes the wrinkles in his faces so deep that theymust cut into the bone; he arms the mouth with ahundred teeth, and the shoulders with ten arms; thehead is surmounted with a monstrous skull; thefeatures grimace; the eyes stick out of the sockets orare sunk deep in them; he accentuates laughing orweeping with the most improbable lines; the breastsfall in folds on the fat of bellies; hips, arms, and legsare all awry, and fingers are knotted like tendrils ofgrape vine. Because of his philosophy he can causemonsters to crawl on his cornices, unfurl them in theyellow silk of his standards, and raise them up at thethreshold of his palaces; he has created a whole armyof heraldic dragons, of phoenixes, unicorns, and writhingchimeras, which are perhaps nothing more than avague memory, transmitted by the old legends, of thelast primitive monsters straying among the first men.In all of this we see the spirit that forces the literarymen to obey a ritual until all their gestures are studied,
Text Appearing After Image:
Tang Art (618-906). Three figurines, terra cotta.(Charles Vignier Collection.) 78 MEDIAEVAL ART that causes the historians to deform history in orderto make it fit the outHne of their systems, that causesthe gardeners to gnarl the trees and manufactureflowers, the fathers to crush the feet of their daughters,and executioners to cut men to pieces. Traditionalmorality will destroy life rather than adopt its freemovement. But also, when life is in accord with morality, whenemotion and will meet in harmony, when the spiritsof goodness, kindness, and justice dwell in the mindof the artist naturally, what goodness, kindness, andjustice there are in the faces and the gestures of thegods! The great Buddhas of gilt wood sit on theirbeds of lotus, their hands open, their faces illuminedby peace, their whole forms filling the shadow of thesanctuary with the glow of the absolute which pene-trates them. To combat them and make men forgettheir serenity, the Taoist priest gathers from life everyenga

Note About Images