Arts and crafts essays . first essential ofa decoration is that it shall be related to its environment, that it shall express or 42 and Design. acknowledge the conditions under which Of Decora-it exists. If a fresco on a wall, for tive1P^in!in_ginstance, it adorns the wall withoutattempting to look like a hole cut in itthrough which something is accidentallyseen ; if a painting on a vase, it acknow-ledges the convexity of the shape, andhelps to express instead of contradictingit; if on a panel in a cabinet or door,it spreads itself in an appropriate fillingon an organic plan to cover it ; bein
Arts and crafts essays . first essential ofa decoration is that it shall be related to its environment, that it shall express or 42 and Design. acknowledge the conditions under which Of Decora-it exists. If a fresco on a wall, for tive1P^in!in_ginstance, it adorns the wall withoutattempting to look like a hole cut in itthrough which something is accidentallyseen ; if a painting on a vase, it acknow-ledges the convexity of the shape, andhelps to express instead of contradictingit; if on a panel in a cabinet or door,it spreads itself in an appropriate fillingon an organic plan to cover it ; being,in short, ornamental by its very nature,its first business is to ornament. There exist, therefore, certain definitetests for the work of the decorative the design fit its place and material ?Is it in scale with its surroundings andin harmony with itself? Is it fair andlovely in colour? Has it beauty andinvention? Has it thought and poeticfeeling? These are the demands adecorator has to answer, and by his 43. answer he must stand or fall; but suchquestions show that the scope of decora-tion is no mean one. It must be acknowledged that amixed exhibition does not easily affordthe fairest or completest tests of suchqualities. An exhibition is at best acompromise, a convenience, a means ofcomparison, and to enable work to beshown to the public; but of course is,after all, only really and properly exhi-bited when it is in the place and positionand light for which it was tests by which to judge a designerswork are only complete then. As the stem and branches to theleaves, flowers, and fruit of a tree, sois design to painting. In decorationone cannot exist without the other, asthe beauty of a figure depends uponthe well-built and well-proportionedskeleton and its mechanism. You cannot 44 separate a house from its plan and Of Decora-foundations. So it is in decoration ; tlve ainting r \ i • anc^ Design. often thought of lightly as somethingtrivial and superf
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