Page:Landscape Painting by Birge Harrison.djvu/105

VALUES This, of course, does not mean that we should paint a gray-day landscape in a key so low that we could give its full force to a burst of sunlight that might suddenly strike across the scene. (If the sunlight is to be included, it should have been conceived as part of the picture in the beginning, and so arranged for.) But it does mean that we should always be able to go a little higher on the high note or a little lower on the low note if it is desirable to do so.

Having decided upon the scale and the register, the next most important thing is so to visualize our subject that we shall be able to group our values in large and simple masses. See big! Grab the essential, and leave the little things for any foolish person who chooses to gather them up. To tell the truth, detail is so blatant, so insistent, that it takes years of hard training to see beyond it, [73]