File:A treatise on painting - In four parts The whole illustrated by examples from the Italian, Venetian, Flemish, and Dutch schools (1837) (14597884987).jpg

Identifier: treatiseonpainti00burn (find matches)
Title: A treatise on painting : In four parts ... The whole illustrated by examples from the Italian, Venetian, Flemish, and Dutch schools
Year: 1837 (1830s)
Authors: Burnet, John, 1784-1868
Subjects: Painting
Publisher: London : James Carpenter
Contributing Library: Getty Research Institute
Digitizing Sponsor: Getty Research Institute

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always bear in mind the necessity of preserving the breadth of light andshade, and the balance and union of hot and cold colours. EXPLANATION OF PLATE I. Fig. 1 represents the colours of the iris, which Sir I. Newton describesas seven, their proportions when produced by means of a prism hecalculates to be as follows: supposing the whole to form 100—Red 11,Orange 8, Yellow 14, Green 17, Blue 17, Purple 11, Violet 22; whetherthe harmony depends upon their natural arrangement, or upon the pro-portions of each, is more an object of philosophy than of painting, whichhas to produce an agreeable sensation, independent of all theoretical dis-quisition. Treatises have been written to prove that the harmony existingin the seven natural notes in music depend upon the same coincidence,insomuch that ocular harpsichords have been constructed exhibitingcolours instead of sounds, and professing to give the same gratification tothe eye that the common ones give to the ear, thus endeavouring to prove
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Lmdm. ft/bKjhed tv J. Carpenter k Joa .OH Bond Jtra* 1927 ON COLOUR IN PAINTING. 7 that painting and music are governed by the same laws of harmony. Thisharmony arising from the iris is noticed by Leonardi da Vinci in hischapter on the beauty of colour ; he says, If you mean that the proximityof one colour should give beauty to another that terminates near it,observe the rays of the sun in the composition of the rainbow; and Ibelieve the late Mr. West endeavoured to establish a theory upon thesame foundation. However, as from any thing I have yet read, and aftera careful examination of the best pictures of the greatest colourists, fromTitian to our own Reynolds, I shall not perplex the student by a repe-tition of the theory; that portion which may be of service to the student(and the worst theory may have some remarkable points of coincidencewith that which I am about to discuss) I shall endeavour to preserve in itsproper place. Plate I. Fig. 2. I have given here the arrangement of Le

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