Page:Landscape Painting by Birge Harrison.djvu/128

LANDSCAPE PAINTING needful of the thing it reflects, and the attention is not distracted in the effort to see two things at once.

I have seen many a poor picture in which two very excellent pictures had been painted upon the same canvas, either of which would have been beautiful by itself. If you wish your message to carry, don't confuse your audience with irrelevancies. Make your single statement clear and forceful and convincing—and let it stand by itself. Don't try to give too much for the money. This is even a worse mistake in art than it is in business. Secondly. "Don't divide your picture into spaces of equal size and proportion." For some psychological reason of which we have not the explanation, the human mind abhors an equal division of space in a picture. Therefore don't put either your horizon line or your [92]