Colour As a Means of Art Being an Adaption of the Experience of Professors to the Practice of Amatures

In the Sketcher's Manual, the general principles of making pictures in black and white, or, as it is technically termed, in Chiaroscuro, have been briefly, but it is hoped distinctly, explained. The following work on Colouring proceeds upon the same method. It treats first of the arrangements of masses of colours which have been established by various masters or schools, and which have been recognized as satisfactory or agreeable by the public voice; it then points out the abstract principles to which these several arrangements may be referred; and finally directs attention to the qualities of Colouring in Art which are requisite as regards the imitation of Nature. It does not profess to descend to details, for these require a considerable advance in the Art, and consequently could not possibly be rendered intelligible in any publication, because they would require the exercise of first-rate powers, to colour every individual impression of the plates. For examples of the details of colouring, the Amateur and the Student must be referred to the best pictures of the several masters whose general principles are herein exhibited. But it should be observed, that although the several masters, whose names have been brought forward in the present work, and in the Sketcher's Manual, as the originators of the several principles of Chiaroscuro and Colour, are generally distinguished by some exercise of the principles to which their names are attached, they have produced many and valuable works in other and very different styles. It is not intended to imply that all the works of these masters are constructed upon the same principles; still less is it intended to imply that the principal merit of these masters resides in the particular principle of picture-making, which they have mainly, if not entirely, contributed to develope; for this would reduce the art of painting to a "mechanical trade," or mere means of gratifying the eye. Least of all has it been intended to afford to critics a means of attack upon the modern masters, whose names have been introduced into these little works, as "painters of pictures on receipt, or on a principle of manufacture." The development of a new principle of Art, whether relating to Composition, Chiaroscuro, or Colour, is as meritorious and worthy of distinction as, if not more so than, the production of an able work upon the principles of Art previously established by others.