KERAMIC STUDIO 
THE APPLICATION OF ORNAMENT 
A. G. Marshall 
INTRODUCTORY 
SOMETHING more than technical ability, though 
it be of the very highest order, is required 
for the accomplishment of successful deco- 
ration. The most admirable skill in the 
handling of processes, joined to the most 
subtle perception of color and tone, and exquisite perfection 
of brush work, may fail totally to produce a fine or even good 
result. The ability to make first-rate pictures may exist, and 
frequently does exist, quite dissociated from any talent for 
applied decoration. Yet it is often assumed that the pictorial 
artist is, of necessity, better equipped as a decorator than the 
man whose life has been spent in decorative art, but who has 
never turned out anything to frame and hang up by an inde- 
pendent string. This attitude is responsible for much false 
decoration, vitiation of taste, and misapplication of pictorial 
talent to utensils and textiles and furniture. It ought to be 
apparent that the function of a dish, for example, is utilitarian, 
and that of a picture is ideal, and that the two functions can- 
not be fulfilled by the same object. The pictorial is too 
precious to be sacrificed to utility, and the use of the dish is 
too important to be destroyed for the sake of supporting pic- 
tures which can be much better done by other and specially 
appropriate materials. Because a landscape or figure or spray 
of flowers is in itself beautiful, is no surety that it will be 
beautiful wherever placed. We would not tread a rare flower 
under foot, or recline against the sky or a fountain, or sit upon 
angels' faces, or eat pudding and milk from the back of a cat. 
Why then should we do these things to the realistic pictures 
of such objects, or paint them where they will be subjected to 
such treatment? This prohibition need not debar the mineral 
painter from reproducing in the most realistic manner flesh 
and fish and bird and beast and fruit and flower and earth and 
air and fire and water, — only keep such representations out of 
platters and soup plates and tea cups and slop bowls and off 
from unbrella stands and jardinieres and soap dishes, reserving 
them for panels and medallions that shall be set apart for 
purely aesthetic purposes. Remember the everlasting fitness 
of things. 
Unfortunately the taste of a great many persons is still 
undeveloped, or as it would rather seem, warped from what 
would be its natural direction had bad examples never been 
set before their eyes. Such persons delight in shams and in- 
congruities and the lavishing of skill upon the most inconse- 
quential and inappropriate objects. Their table service and 
linen must be painted and embroidered with flowers and birds 
and butterflies "so real that you could fairly pick them off," 
they revel in such delectable objects d'art as receivers for hair 
combings made of porcelain in the shape of a feather fan, 
curled up and tied with ribbon with a Watteau scene painted 
on the feathers, and probably would be wafted into the sev- 
enth heaven of aesthetic rapture could they possess a Meis- 
sonier warrior and a Raphael Holy Family ornamenting the 
obverse and reverse sides, of a coal scuttle with roses and 
forget-me-nots around the rim and Cupid and Psyche nestling 
within at the bottom, the handle, perhaps, being a gilt serpent 
and the spout bearing a fictitious coat-of-arms, unity of design 
being supposed to be brought in by a straggling inscription 
setting forth the exciting and novel information that "while I 
was musing, the fire burned." This may be a shocking indict- 
ment, but observation seems to justify it. And yet five 
minutes' reflection ought to convince anyone that things are 
not decorated by haphazard assemblage of designs, nor when 
the objects represented upon them are desecrated by the asso- 
ciation. So, at once and forever, let us eliminate all incon- 
gruity and all realistic painting from the field of applied 
decoration, and instead of striving to make things look like 
what they are not, endeavor to emphasize and beautify them 
for what they are, by means of ornament which is appropriate 
to their use, consistent with the character of their material 
and adapted to their structure and form. 
Good decoration demands that the thing decorated shall 
not be impaired in utility. This object is certainly not attained 
when the decoration is so valuable or so delicate and fragile 
that "Hands off" must be appended for a motto. And right 
here let us protest, with all the energy of our being against 
the practice of having things too fine for use and using things 
too poor to be regarded. This gets one into a rotten-apples 
way of life, if it does not make for actual hypocrisy. Things 
of good design cost no more and are infinitely more satisfying 
that the cheap, flimsy, trashy, "decorated" stuff sold at the 
bargain counter, which seldom fails before many months to 
find its proper level, the ash barrel. Utility is impaired when 
the decoration by its relief or roughness, as about the edge of 
a drinking cup or on the seat or back of a chair, interferes with 
the agreeable and convenient use of the article. Again, the 
decoration may be carved or incised or otherwise applied in a 
way that shall weaken the object. And aesthetically, utility 
is absolutely destroyed by ornament which is incongruous, or 
destructive of the sense of surface or security, as a realistic 
landscape with space and atmosphere to cut beefsteak on, a 
majolica toad or lizard to drink milk from, or table legs which 
appear to be made of flexible ropes. Consistency with the 
character of the object is upset by false decorations like those 
just mentioned and by anything applied to it which would 
suggest that it is not in substance or form or purpose just 
what it is. Adaptation to structure and form require that the 
decoration shall not actually or apparently falsify the material, 
or weaken it, or add needlessly to its strength in any part, 
shall not disturb its balance or relation of parts, and shall con- 
form to its surface and structural lines. If a proposed decor- 
ation is found to be unfit in any of these essentials, it should 
be rejected without hesitation and something else substituted. 
The points involved in the adaptation of designs to deco- 
rative purposes seem to be less generally understood than 
almost anything else in the realm of decorative art. And yet 
they are of the very first importance, and if more appreciated 
we might be spared some things, such as over-gilding, making 
fine porcelain look like clumsy metal work, imitations of 
baskets and lace in china and metal and solid wood and a 
thousand other tasteless shams, as well as ornaments stuck 
on wholly unrelated to the spaces they are supposed to adorn. 
One of the most frequent and serious faults is over-decoration. 
This error is most likely to arise from lack of knowledge as to 
the effective disposition of ornament, no arrangement seeming 
satisfactory, short of a surfeit of crowded details which may 
be supposed to reach finality by the uninstructed lavishment 
of labor, like a case of hopeless disease, where "all has been 
done that could be done," — except to cure. 
LUSTRES 
Chatoyant is a deep rose with a gold lustre. It is easily 
spotted and must be very carefully treated. Light green 
makes a very pretty effect over this color. 
