PARTISAN REVIEW
It is easy to point out that a painting is flat,-hence must
be
regarded from a comparatively limited radius, and thus can
never change either its formal aspect or the juxtaposition of its
shapes beyond the limits of light-variation.
A
statue, on the other
hand, must stand inspection from any number of angles, and the
relation of forms is constantly changing,-even a bas-relief can
vary surprisingly as the point of view is shifted. But a painting
must rely upon illusion for whatever three-dimensional or "real"
activity takes place within the limits of its frame. Not only the
illustrational but the tactile appeal must be made credible by
tricks or symbols that fool the eye yet at the same time must
provide esthetic satisfaction. As the cinema depends on a defect
of the human eye, without which we would see only a rapid suc–
cession of images, so the painter presupposes a gullibility of the
mind that will automatically accept his plastic symbols. I refer
not only to such specific signs as shadows which serve to identify
the shape and relative position of the forms, but colors that tend
to advance or recede, not to mention the countless resources whicn
the painter unconsciously transcribes out of sensations experienced
in the world around him. Sculpture, by contrast, is thoroughly
frank, and the response to its appeal is apparent and instan·
taneous.* Anyone, upon glancing at a statue, feels instinctively
that he can grasp it and run his fingers over it completely.
It is natural that the relative scope of the two "free" plastic
art-forms should have been often compared. Architecture has
usually escaped such comparison, differentiated, no doubt, by its
utilitarian restrictions. Michael Angelo was reticent about pro·
nouncing a preference, but finally admitted that it was sculpture
which was the greater because it was "harder to do." (This con·
tention elicited an opposite conclusion from Dr. Johnson which
justly aroused Boswell's dismay: "Painting consumes labor not
disproportionate to its effect; but a fellow will hack half a year
*I am indebted to Meyer Schapiro for calling my attention to a sect in the
Byzantine period known as the Iconoclasts, who provide a pertinent instance of
thi~
basic divergence between painting and sculpture. The Iconoclasts bitterly opposed
sculpture as being so "real" as to be idolatrous, although of painting they approved.
Aside from incalculable destruction, they forced the adoption of new rules as to
what constituted sculpture. (In these we have a curious anticipation of the sculp·
ture·definitions enforced by the U. S. Customs, that were aired in the famous
Brancusi case.)
