6 Thoughts en Colouring. 



light ; and it is evident that the ground was not intended to 

 make the leaft part of the effect in the picture originally, as 

 the thinnefs in the colour above alluded to, looks as if owing 

 to accident, and the hafte of a man who could fell all the 

 pictures he painted. 



I have already mentioned that the beft general fliadow 

 colour is ivory black, See. which, if the lights and middle 

 tints are coloured as near nature as poffible, may be enriched 

 by glazing; or the glazing may be done on the middle tints, 

 and the lights of one general hue laid on them, which ap- 

 pears at times to have been the practice of Titian. The fol- 

 lowing remark on the picture of Diana and Califto, may 

 ferve as a further illuftration : — " There appears to be yellow 

 in all the lights, even the blue ; I therefore infer, that they 

 confidered the light as giving a colour, or of changing, in a 

 fmall degree, the local colour of the objects, and that their 

 principle of colouring was thus : the lights on the objeBs par- 

 took of the colour of the light, the middle tints gave the local 

 colour, and the fhadoivs warm, and pretty miich of one hue.' 

 A picture painted on the above plan, will have a harmonious 

 and pleafant effect. 



I wifh the artifts of any eminence would communicate the 

 refult of their practice ; much good would arife from it* 

 Fine writing is not a neceffary requifite; for, in matters in- 

 tended to inftruct, clcamefs will more than compenfate for 

 want of elegance : fuch a conduct would contribute to re- 

 move many of the practical difficulties the ftudent labours 

 under ; an inconvenience I myfelf have greatly felt. 



It is very rarely that you fee a diftinct or whole colour in 

 the Venetian pictures; as their blues feldom go beyond a 

 violet, and the reds, a crimfon. " In all the pictures in the 

 room (Orleans collection) by this matter (Titian), no one 

 decifive colour is to be feen, as they are all broken to corre- 

 fpond with each other: that is, the red are broken with yel- 

 low, yellows with red, and fo on. He appears to have been 

 particularly careful not to introduce blue or cold colours, 

 and, when they do occur, it is only in fmall quantities." 



I would by no means have it underftood that I wifh to 



tie the artift down to a particular manner of colouring j one 



3 of 



