2^8 
KERAMIC STUDIO 
THE APPLICATION OF ORNAMENT 
A. G. Marshall 
FIFTHJPAPER. 
HE decoration of any object is a problem 
of filling a space of a given form with 
agreeable subdivisions, by means of lines 
and masses of light and daik. Color may 
be added as a crowning glory, or the 
work may be carried out in simple monochrome. In either 
case the lines and the light and dark space covering (what the 
Japanese call the "notan" ) constitute the design, and unless 
these are right, all the tints the goddess Iris ever distilled 
from the rainbow, blent in the sweetest and most heavenly 
"tonality," and all the rest of it, will not help the matter in 
the least so far as true decoration goes. And this is just what 
is the matter with nine-tenths of the pretty things done by 
amateurs, with the purest of motives and loveliest faith in 
their "art." And nearly all the "decorated" things sold in 
stores to eat and drink from and to hold flowers or perfumes 
or illuminants, or just to set up and admire, fail miserably on 
the side of design. The color, as a rule, is pleasing, often 
distinguished ; and that only aggravates the trouble, begotten 
of a widespread and thoughtless taste for realism in matters 
botanical and zoological misapplied to decorative purposes. 
However well painted a realistic bunch of flowers, flock of 
birds, string of fish, pack of animals, group of human beings, 
or a natural landscape, — anything, in short, in the way of a 
picture clapped into a plate or onto a vase or jug, is not deco- 
ration in any sense, but is lamentably false art and wasted 
effort. I revert to this point simply because evidences on all 
ments of ornament were 
undoubtedly suggested 
by structural necessi- 
ties. With fragile mate- 
rials like unbaked clay, a 
vessel was very weak 
and liable to be broken 
at the edge. So it 
was here strengthened 
either by a band of 
woven or twisted grass or perhaps a strip of textile fabrics 
fastened around under the edge (Fig. i). For the same 
reason, and in similar manner, places of abrupt curvature and 
projecting handles and spouts were strengthened (Fig. 2), 
and large utensils, being specially liable to accident from their 
great weight, were re- 
inforced by vertical 
bands secured by cross 
strips, or enclosed by 
basket work (Fig. 3). 
When baking the 
clay was discovered, 
with the great increase 
of strength, and still 
more after the invention oi glazes, it was no longer found 
necessary to strengthen such places, and thinner and less 
clumsy construction was possible. But the primitive potter, 
feeling the plainness of his wares without variation of surface, 
naturally followed the old lines of reinforcement with rude 
ornaments suggesting those structural helps (Figs. 4, 5 and 6.) 
And his ideas for the use of decorative bands, stripes and all 
over-patterns, being aesthetically right, cannot be improved 
upon to-day. The line, the enriched band or border, and the 
elaborate frieze give a sense of security and are felt to be 
appropriate around the edges of a dish, and about slender 
parts, and at places where there is an abrupt change of curva- 
ture or very full bulging. In other situations these ornaments 
are out of place. We feel at once that the bands are in 
the right places in Fig. 7, and in the wrong ones in Fig. 8. 
hands shows that it needs to be iterated and reiterated and 
dingdonged as often as a call to a Mussulman's prayer. 
There are a few principles governing the use of ornament Flg ' s ' 
upon utensils that were instinctively discovered by primitive So with vertical lines and all over-patterns. They fulfill an 
peoples, and that are just as sound to-day as at the beginning, aesthetic purpose in the examples in Fig. 9, but none whatever 
for the kind of ornament to which they apply. The rudi- in those shown in Fig. 10, where the verticals are applied to 
