History of art . ction we find again thesegeometrical forms—short, fat,dense, and pressed closely to-gether. As mathematics, thescience of inert forms, pre-ceded biology, so geometricalornament preceded livingornament, and certain childpeoples, incapable of interpret-ing life, have arrived, in orna-mental art, at the highest degreeof power. The human mindproceeds always from the simpleto the complex, but when thegreat artist appears to unite themost differentiated living formsthrough a single arabesque, orwhen modern science tries to ex-press all its conquests in mathe-matical symbols, the min
History of art . ction we find again thesegeometrical forms—short, fat,dense, and pressed closely to-gether. As mathematics, thescience of inert forms, pre-ceded biology, so geometricalornament preceded livingornament, and certain childpeoples, incapable of interpret-ing life, have arrived, in orna-mental art, at the highest degreeof power. The human mindproceeds always from the simpleto the complex, but when thegreat artist appears to unite themost differentiated living formsthrough a single arabesque, orwhen modern science tries to ex-press all its conquests in mathe-matical symbols, the mind isinvariably brought back toprimitive sources, the very onesat which instinct slaked itsthirst. The result is always theimpressive agreement betweenthe most obscure feeling andthe highest form of general, we need not seek, in the art of the Negroes,anything more than that still unreasoned feeling whichmerely obeys the most elementary demands of rhythmand of symmetry. When the youthful peoples follow. Africa. Great helmet of the Baoules for the GouU dance (Ivory Coast). (Guillaume Collection.)
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Keywords: ., boo, bookcentury1900, bookdecade1920, booksubjectart, bookyear1921
