Objects of Curious Virtue, artwork entitled The Virtue of Stained Earth. THE VIRTUE OF STAINED EARTH: Jars and vials of sediments and pigments, flasks of colour in powdered and liquid form; here and there lumps of mineral and natural earth punctuate the shelves to introduce mineral colour as crystal shape. These are visual analogues for natural, mineralogical and chemical processes reflecting the banding of strata or the colour zoning found in fluorspar and other crystals. They represent the residue of ancient transformations that once were and still are active in some invisible realm, deeply rooted in natural systems or in the residue of human preoccupations. Such dynamic processes are an aspect of a creative principle that is familiar to the artist and which inspired John Ruskin to pen the following lines in so describing the transformation of substance through process into perfect from: “Let us suppose that this ounce of mud is left in perfect rest, and that its elements gather together, like to like, so that their atoms may get into the closest relations possible. Let the clay begin. Ridding itself of all foreign substance, it gradually becomes a white earth, already very beautiful; and fit with the help of congealing fire, to be made into the finest porcelain, and painted on, and be kept in king’s palaces. But such artificial consistence is not its best. Leave it still quiet to follow its own instinct of unity, and it becomes not only white, but clear; not only clear, but hard; nor only clear and hard, but so set that it can deal with light in a wonderful way, and gather out of it the loveliest blue rays only, refusing the rest. We call it then a sapphire. Such being the consummation of the clay, we give similar permission of quiet to the sand. It also becomes, first, a white earth, then proceeds to grow clear and hard, and at first arranges itself in mysterious, infinitely parallel lines, which have the power of reflecting not merely the blue rays, but the green, purple, and red rays in the greatest beauty in which they can be seen through any hard material whatsoever. We call it then an opal. In next order the soot sets to work; it cannot make itself white at first, but instead of being discouraged, tries harder and harder, and comes out clear at last, and the hardest thing in the world; and for the blackness that it had, obtains in exchange the power of reflecting all the rays of the sun at once in the vividest blaze that any solid thing can shoot. We call it then a diamond. Last of all the water purifies or unites itself, contented enough if it only reach the form of a dew-drop; but if we insist on its proceeding to a more perfect consistence, it crystallises into the shape of a star. And for the ounce of slime which we had by political economy of competition, we have by political economy of co-operation, a sapphire, an opal, and a diamond, set in the midst of a star of snow.” THE MAKING OF GEMS: Modern painters, Vol. V, Part VII, ch. I.
Posted on: Mon, 03 Nov 2014 18:32:39 +0000
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